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LIFE AND PIJBLK! SERVICES 



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LIBERE REPUBLICAK CANDIDATE 

FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITEI) STATES, 

AND OV 

HON.B. GRATZ BROWN. 

CANDIDATE FOR VICE PRESIDENT: 
WITH A RECORD OF 

liiE wiimi Of HIE mmi\ mmim, 

ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE, PLATFORM OF THE PARTY, 
KTC, ETC. 



IXjLTJSTIE^J^TEnD. 



PUBLISHED BY 

G O O D S P E F 1 )'S K M P I R E PUBLISHING HOUSE 

Chicago, III., 51 S. Carpenter St. Cincinnati, C, 179 W. Fourth St. 

St. Louis, Mo., 314 Olive St. New Orleans, La., 41 Natchez St. 

NfaV York, 107 Liberty St,' 

1872 




Hon. Horace Greeley. 



the: lii^e: 



OF 



Liheral Itepuhlicau 
Candidate for President of the United States, 



j^^Y^^^HE name of Greeley is an old and not uncommon one in 

f^ New England. The tradition is, that very early in the 
) history of New England — probably as early as 1650 — three 
brothers, named Greeley, emigrated from the neighborhood 
of Nottingham, England. One of them is supposed to have set- 
tled finally in Maine, another in Rhode Island, the third in Mass- 
achusetts. All the Greeleys in New England have descended from 
these three brothers, and the branch of the family with which we 
have to do, from him who settled in Massachusetts. Respecting 
the condition and social rank of these brothers,their occupation and 
character, tradition is silent. But from the fact that no coat-of- 
arms has been preserved or ever heard of by any member of the 
family, and from the occupation of the majority of their descend- 
ants, it is plausibly conjectured that they were farmers of mod- 
erate means and of the middle class. 

Tradition futher hints that the name of the brother who found a 
home in Massachusetts was Benjamin, that he was a farmer, that he 
lived in Haverhill, a township bordering on the south-eastern cor- 
ner of New Hampshire, that he prospered there, and died respect- 
ed by all who knew him, at a good old age. So far, tradition. We 
now draw from the memory of individuals still living. 

The son of Benjamin (Greeley was Ezekiel, " old Captian Ezekiel," 
who lived and greatly flourished at Hudson, New Hampshire, then 
known as Nottingham West, and is well remembered there and in 
all the region round about. The captain was not a military man. 
He was half lawyer, half farmer. He was a sharp, cunning, schem- 
ing, cool-headed, cold-hearted man, one who lived by his wits, who 
always got his cases, always succeeded in his plans, always pros- 
pered in his speculations, and grew rich without ever doing a day's 



4 LIFE OK HORACE GREELEY. 

work in his life. He is remembered by his grandsons, who saw 
him in their childhood, as a black-eyed, black-haired, heavy-brow- 
ed, stern-looking man, of complexion almost as dark as that of an 
Indian, and not unlike an Indian in temper. " A cross old dog," 
" a hard old knot," " as cunning as Lucifer," are among the compli- 
mentary expressions bestowed upon him by his descendants. "All 
he had," says one, " was at the service of the rich, but he was hard 
upon the poor." " His religion was nominally Baptist," says anoth- 
er, " but really to get money." He got all he could and saved all 
he got," chimes in a third. He died at the age of sixty-five, with 
" all his teeth sound, and worth three hundred acres of good land." 
He is spoken of with that sincere respect which, in New England, 
seems never to be denied to a very smart man, who succeeds by 
strictly legal means in acquiring property, however wanting in prin- 
ciple, however destitute of feeling, that man may be. Happily, the 
wife of old Captain Ezekiel was a gentler and better being than 
her husband. 

And, therefore, Zaccheus, the son of old Captain Ezekiel, was a 
gentler and better man than his father. Zaccheus inherited part of 
his father's land, and was a farmer all the days of his life. He 
was not, it appears, " too fond of work," though far more industri- 
ous than his father; a man who took life easily, of strict integrity, 
kind-hearted, gentle-mannered, not ill to do in the world, but not 
what is called in New England " fore-handed." He is remember- 
ed in the neighborhood where he lived chiefly for his extaordinary 
knowledge of the Bible. He could quote texts more readily, cor- 
rectly, and profusely than any of his neighbors, laymen or clergy- 
men. He had the reputation of knowing the whole Bible by heart. 
He was a Baptist; and all who knew him unite in declaring that a 
worthier man never lived than Zaccheus Greeley. He had a large 
family, and lived to the age of ninety-five. 

His second son was named Zaccheus also, and he is the father 
of Horace Greeley. He is still living, and cultivates an ample do- 
main in Erie county, Pennsylvania, acquired in part by his own ar- 
duous labors, in part by the labors of his second son, and in part by 
the liberality of his eldest son, Horace. At this time, nearly eighty 
years of age, his form is as straight, his step as decided, his consti- 
tution nearly as firm, and his look nearly as young, as though he 
were in the prime of life. 

All the Greeleys are persons of marked and peculiar characters. 
Many of them are " characters." The word which perhaps best 
describes the quality for which they are distinguished is tenacity 
They are, as a race, tenacious of life, tenacious of opinions and pref- 
erences, of tenacious memory,. and tenacious of their purposes. 
One member of the family died at the age of one hundred and 
twenty years; and a large proportion of the early generations lived 
more than three score years and ten. Few of the name have been 
rich, but most have been persons of substance and respectability, 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 5 

acquiring their property, generally, by the cultivation of the soil, 
and a soil, too, which does not yield its favors to the sluggard. 
Tt is the boast of those members of the family who have attended 
to its genealogy, that no Greeley was ever a prisoner, a pauper, or 
worse than either, a tory ! Two of Horace Greeley's great uncles 
perished at Bennington, and he was fully justified in his assertion, 
made in the heat of the Roman controversy a few years ago, that 
he was " born of republican parentage, of an ancestry which parti- 
cipated vividly in the hopes and fears, the convictions and efforts of 
the American Revolution." And he added: "We cannot disavow 
nor prove recreant to the principles on which that Revolution was 
justified — on which only it can be justified. If adherence to these 
principles makes us ' the unmitigated enemy of Pius IX.,' we regret 
the enmity, but cannot abjure our principles." 

The maiden name of Horace Greeley's mother was Woodburn, 
Mary Woodburn, of Londonderry. 

The founder of the Woodburn family in this country was John 
Woodburn, who emigrated from Londonderry in Ireland, to Lon- 
donderry in New Hampshire, about the year 1825, seven years 
after the settlement of the original sixteen families. He never came 
over with his brother David, who was drowned a few years after, leav- 
ing a family. 

Neither of the brothers actually served in the siege of London- 
derry ; they were too young for that ; but they were both men of the 
true Londonderry stamp, men with a good stroke in their arms, a 
merry twinkle in their eyes, indomitable workers, and not more 
brave in fight than indefatigable in frolic ; fair-haired men like all 
their brethren, and gall-less. 

John Woodburn obtained the usual grant of one hundred and 
twenty acres of land, besides the " out-lot and home-lot " before 
alluded to, and he took root in Londonderry and flourished. He 
was twice married, and was the father of two sons and nine daugh- 
ters, all of whom (as children did in those healthy times) lived to 
maturity, and all but one married. John Woodburn s second 
wife, from whom Horace Greeley is descended, was a remarkable 
woman. Mr. Greeley has borne this testimony to her worth and 
influence, in a letter to a friend which some years ago escaped 
into print : " I think I am indebted for my first impulse toward 
intellectual acquirement and exertion to my mother's grandmother, 
who came out from Ireland among the first settlers in London- 
derry. She must have been well versed in Irish and Scotch tra- 
ditions, pretty well informed and strong-minded; and my mother 
being left motherless when quite young, her grandmother exerted 
great influence over her mental development. I was a third child, 
the two preceding having died young, and I presume my mother 
was the more attached to me on that ground, and the extreme 
feebleness of my constitution. My mind was early filled by her 
with the traditions, ballads, and snatches of history she had 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 



learned from her grandmother, which, though conveying very dis- 
torted and incorrect ideas of history, yet served to awaken in me 
a thirst for knowledge and a lively interest in learning and his- 
tory." John Woodburn died in 1780. Mrs. Woodburn, the sub- 
ject of the passage just quoted, survived her husband many years, 
lived to see her children's grandchildren, and to acquire through- 
out the neighborhood the familiar title of "Granny Woodburn." 
David Woodburn, the grandfather of Horace Greeley, was the eld- 
est son of John Woodburn, and the inheritor of his estate. He 
married Margaret Clark, a granddaughter of that Mrs. Wilson, the 
touching story of whose deliverance from pirates was long a favor- 
ite tale at the firesides of the early settlers of New Hampshire. 
In 1720, a ship containing a company of Irish emigrants bound to 
New England was captured by pirates, and while the ship was in 
their possession, and the fate of the pasengers still undecided, Mrs. 
Wilson, one of the company, gave birth to her first child. The cir- 
cumstance so moved thepiratecaptain, who was himself a husband 
and a father, that he permitted the emigrants to pursue their voyage 
unharmed. He bestowed upon Mrs. Wilson some valuable pres- 
ents, among others a silk dress, pieces of which are still preserved 
among her descendants ; and he obtained from her a promise that 
she would call the infant by the name of his wife. The ship reach- 
ed its destination in safety, and the day of its deliverance from the 
hands of the pirates was annually observed as a day of thanksgiv- 
ing by the passengers for many years. Mrs. Wilson, after the death 
of her first husband, became the wife of James Clark, whose son 
John was the father of Mrs. David Woodburn, whose daughter 
Mary was the mother of Horace Greeley. 

The descendants of John Woodburn are exceedingly numerous, 
and contribute largely, says Mr. Parker, the historian of London- 
derry, to the hundred thousand who are supposed to have 
descended from the early settlers of the town. The grandson of 
John Woodburn, a very genial and jovial gentleman, still owns and 
tills the land originally granted to the family. At the old home- 
stead, about the year 1807, Zaccheus Greeley and Mary Wood- 
burn were married. 

Zaccheus Greeley inherited nothing from his father, and Mary 
Woodburn received no more than the usual household portion 
from hers. Zaccheus, as the sons of New England farmers usu- 
ally do, or did in those days, went out to work as soon as he was 
old enough to do a day's work. He saved his earnings, and in 
his twenty-fifth year was the owner of a farm in the town of Am- 
herst, Hillsl)orough county, New Hampshire. 

There, on the third of February, 181 1, Horace Greeley, was 
born. He is the third of seven children, of whom the two elder 
died before he was born, and the four younger are still living. 

The mode of his entrance upon the stage of the world was, to 
say the least of it, unusual. The effort was almost too much for 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 'j 

liim, and, to use the language of one who was present, "he came 
into the world as black as a chimney." There were no signs of 
life. He uttered no cry ; he made no motion ; he did not breathe. 
But the little discolored stranger had articles to write, and was 
not permitted to escape his destiny. In this alarming crisis of 
his existence, a kind-hearted and experienced aunt came to his 
rescue, and by arts which to kind-hearted and experienced aunts 
are well known, but of which the present chronicler remains in 
ignorance, the boy was brought to life. He soon began to 
breathe ; then he began to blush ; and by the time he had attained 
the age of twenty minutes, lay on his mother's arm, a red and 
smiling infant. 

In due time, the boy received the name of Horace. There had 
teen another little Horace Greeley before him, but he had died 
in infancy, and his ])arents wished to preserve in their second son 
a living memento of their first. The name was not introduced 
into the family from any partiality on the part of his parents for 
the Roman poet, but because his father had a relative so named, 
and because the mother had read the name in a book and liked 
the sound of it. The sound of it, however, did not often regale 
the maternal ear; for, in New England, where the name of the 
courtly satirist is frequently given, its household diminutive is 
" Hod ; " and by that elegant monosyllable the boy was commonly 
•called among his juvenile friends. 

Amherst is the county town of Hillsborough, one of the three 
<;ounties of New Hampshire which are bounded on the south by 
the State of Massachusetts. It is forty-two miles north-west of 
Boston. 

The village of Amherst is a pleasant place. Seen from the 
summit of a distant hill, it is a white dot in the middle of a level 
plain, encircled by cultivated and gently-sloping hills. On a 
nearer approach the traveler perceives that it is a cluster of white 
houses, looking as if they had alighted among the trees and might 
take to wing again. On entering it he finds himself in a very 
pretty village, built round an ample green and shaded by lofty 
trees. It contains three churches, a printing-office, a court-house, 
.a jail, a tavern, half a dozen stores, an exceedingly minute watch- 
maker's shop, and a hundred private houses. There is not a 
human being to be seen, nor a sound to be heard, except the twit- 
tering of birds overhead, and the distant whistle of a locomotive, 
which in those remote regions seems to make the silence audible. 
The utter silence and the deserted aspect of the older villages in 
New England are remarkable. In the morning and evening there 
is some appearance of life in Amherst ; but in the hours of the day 
when the men are at work, the women busy with their household 
affairs, and the children at school, the visitor may sit at the win- 
dow of the village tavern for an hour at a time and not see a liv- 
ing creature. Occasionally a peddler, with sleigh-bells round his 



8 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

ftorse, goes jingling by. Occasionally a farmer's wagon drives 
up to one of the stores. Occasionally a stage, rocking in its 
leather suspenders, stops at the post-office for a moment, and then 
rocks away again. Occasionally a doctor passes in a very anti- 
quated gig. Occasionally a cock crows, as though he were tired 
of the dead silence. A New York village, a quarter the size and 
wealth of Amherst, makes twice its noise and bustle. Forty years 
ago, however, when Horace Greeley used to come to the stores 
there, it was a place of somewhat more importance and more busi- 
ness than it is now, for Manchester and Nashua have absorbed 
many of the little streams of traffic which used to flow towards 
the county town. It is a curious evidence of the stationary char- 
acter of the place, that the village paper, which had fifteen hun- 
dred subscribers when Horace Greeley was three years old, and 
learned to read from it, has fifteen hundred subscribers, and no 
more, at this moment. It bears the same name it did then, is pub- 
lished by the same person, and adheres to the same party. 

The farm owned by Zaccheus Greeley when his son Horace was 
born, was four or five miles from the village of Amherst. It con- 
sisted of fifty acres of land — heavy land to till — rocky, moist and 
uneven, worth then eight hundred dollars, now two thousand. The 
house, a small, unpainted, but substantial and well-built farm- 
house, stood, and still stands, upon a ledge or platform, half-way 
up a high, steep, and rocky hill, commanding an extensive and 
almost panoramic view of the surrounding country In whatever 
direction the boy may have looked, he saw rock. Rock is the 
feature of the landscape. There is rock in the old orchard be- 
hind the house ; rocks peep out from the grass in the pastures ; 
there is rock along the road; rock on the sides of the hills ; rock 
on their summits; rock in the valleys; rock in the woods ; — rock, 
rock, everywhere rock. And yet the country has not a barren 
look. I should call it a serious looking country ; one that would 
be congenial to grim covenanters and exiled round-heads. The 
prevailing colors are dark, even in the brightest month of the 
year. The pine woods, the rock, the shade of the hill, the color 
of the soil, are all dark and serious. It is a still, unfrequented 
region. One may ride along the road upon which the house 
stands, for many a mile, without passing a single vehicle. The 
turtles hobble across the road fearless of the crushing wheel. If 
any one wished to know the full meaning of the word country., as 
distinguished from the word town, he need do no more than ascend 
the hill on which Horace Greeley saw the light and look around. 

Yet, the voice of the city is heard even there; the opinions of 
the city influence there; for, observe, in the very room in which 
our hero was born, on a table which stands where, in other days, 
a bed stood, we recognize, among the heap of newspapers, the 
well-known heading of the Weekly Tribune. 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 9 

Such was the character of the region in which Horace Greeley 
passed the greater part of the first seven years of his life. His 
father's neighbors were all hard-working farmers — men who worked 
their own farms — who were nearly ec^ual in wealth, and to whom 
the idea of social inequality, founded upon an inequality in pos- 
sessions, did not exist, even as an idea. Wealth and want were 
alike unknown. It was a community of plain people, who had 
derived all their book-knowledge from the district school, and de- 
pended upon the village newspaper for their knowledge of the 
world without. There were no heretics among them. All the 
people either cordially embraced or undoubtingly assented to the 
faith called Orthodox, and all of them attended, more or less reg- 
ularly the churches in which that faith was expounded. 

The first great peril of his existence escaped, the boy grew 
apace, and passed through the minor and ordinary dangers of 
infancy without having his equanimity seriously disturbed. He 
was a "quiet and peaceable child," reports his father, and, though 
far from robust, suffered little from actual sickness. 

To say that Horace Greeley, from the earliest months of his 
existence, manifested signs of extraordinary intelligence, is only 
to repeat what every biographer asserts of his hero, and every 
mother of her child. Yet, common-place as it is, the truth must 
be told. Horace Greeley did, 3.=, a very young child, manifest signs 
of extraordinary intelligence. He took to learning with the 
promptitude and instinctive, irrepressible love with which a duck 
is said to take to the water. His first instructor was his mother; 
and never was there a mother better calculated to awaken the 
mind of a child, and keep it awake, than Mrs. Greeley. 

Tall, muscular, well-formed, with the strength of a man without 
his coarseness, active in her habits, not only capable of hard 
work, but delighting in it, with a perpetual overflow of animal 
spirits, an exhaustless store of songs, ballads and stories, and a 
boundless, exuberant good will toward all living things, Mrs. 
Greeley was the life of the house, the favorite of the neighbor- 
hood, the natural friend and ally of children ; whatever she did 
she did "with a will." She was a great reader, and remembered 
all she read. "She worked," says one of my informants, "in 
doors and out of doors, could out-rake any man in the town, and 
could load\.\\& hay-wagons as fast and as well as her husband. She 
hoed in the garden ; she labored in the field ; and, while doing 
more than the work of an ordinary man and an ordinary woman 
combined, would laugh and sing all day long, and tell stories all 
the evening." 

To these stories the boy listened greedily, as he sat on the floor 
at her feet, while she spun and talked with equal energy. They 
" served," says Mr. Greeley, in a passage already quoted, " to 
awaken in me a thirst for knowledge, and a lively interest in learn- 
ing and history." Think of it, you word-mongering, gerund- 



lO LIKE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

grinding teachers who delight in signs and symbols, and figures 
and "facts," and feed little children's souls on the dry, innutri- 
■cious husks of knowledge ; and think of it, you play-abhorring, 
fiction-forbidding parents ! Awaken the hitcrest in learning, and 
the thirst for knowledge, and there is no predicting what may or 
what may not result from it. Scarcely a man, distinguished for the 
supremacy or the beauty of his immortal part, has written the 
history of his childhood without recording the fact that the celes- 
tial fire was first kindled in his soul by means similar to those 
which awakened an " interest in learning " and a " thirst for 
knowledge " in the mind of Horace Greeley. 

Horace learned to read before he had learned to talk ; that is, 
before he could pronounce the longer words. No one regularly 
taught him. When he was little more than two years old, he be- 
gan to pore over the Bible, opened for his entertainment on the 
floor, and examine with curiosity the newspaper given him to play 
with. He cannot remember a time when he could not read, nor 
can any one give an account of the process by which he learned, 
except that he asked (juestions incessantly, first about the pictures 
in the newspaper, tlicn about the capital letters, then about the 
smaller ones, and finally about the words and sentences. At three 
years of age he could read easily and correctly any of the books 
prepared for children ; and at four, any book whatever. But he 
was not satisfied with overcoming the ordinary difficulties of read- 
ing. Allowing that nature gives to every child a certain amount 
of mental force to be used in acquiring the art of reading, Hor- 
ace had an overplus of that force, which he employed in learning 
to read with his book in positions which increased the difficulty 
of the feat. All the friends and neighbors of his early childhood, 
in reporting him a prodigy unexampled, adduce as the unanswer- 
able and clinching proof of the fact, that, at the age of four years, 
he could read any book in whatever position it might be placed — 
right-side up, up-side down, or sidewise. 

His fondness for reading grew with the growth of his mind, till 
it amounted to a passion. His father's stock of books was small 
indeed. It consisted of a Bible, a "Confession of Faith," and 
perhaps all told, twenty volumes beside ; and they by no means 
of a kind calculated to foster a love of reading in the mind of a 
little boy. But a weekly ne7uspaper came to the house from the 
village of Amherst; and, except his mother's tales, that newspa- 
per probably had more to do with the opening of the boy's mind 
and the tendency of his opinions, than anything else. The fam- 
ily well remember the eagerness with which he anticipated its 
coming. Paper-day was the brightest of the week. An hour 
before the post-rider was expected, Horace would walk down the 
road to meet him, bent on having the first read ; and when he 
had got possession of the precious sheet, he would hurry with it 
to some secluded place, lie down on the grass, and greedily devour 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. II 

its contents. The paper was called (and is still) the Fanner^s 
Cabinet. It was mildly Whig in politics. The selections were 
religious, agricultural and miscellaneous; the editorials few, brief, 
and amiable ; its summary of news scanty in the extreme. But 
it was the only bearer of tidings from the Great World. It con- 
nected the little brown house on the rocky hill of Amherst with 
the general life of mankind. The boy, before he could read him- 
self, and before he could understand the meaning of war and 
bloodshed, doubtless heard his father read in it of the tri- 
umphs and disasters of the Second War with Great Britain, and 
of the rejoicings at the conclusion of ])eace. He himself may 
have read of Decatur's gallantry m the war with Algiers, of Wel- 
lington's victory at Waterloo, of Napoleon's fretting away his life 
on the rock of St. Helena, of Monroe's inauguration, of the dis- 
mantling of the fleets on the great lakes, of the progress of the 
Erie Canal project, of Jackson's inroads into Florida, and the 
'subsequent cession of that province to the United States, of the 
first meeting of Congress in the Capitol, of the passage of the 
Missouri Compromise. During the progress of the various com- 
mercial treaties with the States of Europe, which were negotiated 
after the conclusion of the general peace, the whole theory, prac- 
tice, and history of commercial intercourse, were amply discussed 
in Congress and the newspapers ; and the mind of Horace, even 
in his ninth year, was mature enough to take some interest in the 
subject, and derive some impressions from its discussion. The 
Farmer s Cabinet, which brought all these and countless other 
ideas and events to bear on the education of the boy, is now one 
of the thousand papers with which the Tribune exchanges. 

So entire and passionate a devotion to the acquisition of knowl- 
edge in one so young, would be remarkable in any circumstances. 
But when the situation of the boy is considered — living in a remote 
and very rural district — few books accessible — few literary persons 
residing near — the school contributing scarcely anything to his 
mental nourishment — no other boy in the neighborhood manifest- 
ing any particular interest in learning — the people about him all 
engaged in a rude and hard struggle to extract the means of sub- 
sistence from a rough and rocky soil — such an intense, absorbing, 
and persistent love of knowledge as that exhibited by Horace 
Greeley, must be accounted very extraordinary. 

That his neighbors so accounted it, they are still eager to attest. 
Continually the wonder grew, that one small head should carry all 
he knew. 

But while thus Horace was growing up to meet his destiny, 
pressing forward on the rural road to learning, and secreting char- 
acter in that secluded home, a cloud, undiscerned by him, had 
come over his father's prospects. It began to gather when the 
boy was little more than six years old. In his seventh year it 
broke, and drove the family, for a time, from house and land. In 



12 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

his tenth, it had completed its work — his father was a ruined man, 
an exile, a fugitive from his native State. 

The way to thrive in New Hampshire was to work very hard> 
keep the store-bill small, stick to the farm, and be no man's secu- 
rity. Of these four things, Horace's father did only one — he 
worked hard. He was a good workman, methodical, skillful, and 
persevering. But he speculated in lumber, and lost money by it. 
He was " bound," as they say in the country, for another man, and 
had to pay the money which that other man failed to pay. He 
had a free and generous nature, lived well, treated the men whom 
he employed liberally, and in various ways swelled his account 
with the storekeeper. 

Those, too, were the jolly, bad days, when everybody drank 
strong drinks, and no one supposed that the affairs of life could 
possibly be transacted without its agency, any more than a ma- 
chine could ^i^'v? without the lubricating oil. A field could not be 
" logged," hay could not be got in, a harvest could not be gath- ' 
ered, unless the jug of liquor stood by the spring, and unless the 
spring was visited many times in the day by all hands. No visitor 
could be sent unmoistened away. No holiday could be celebrated 
without drinking booths. At weddings, at christenings, at fune- 
rals, rum seemed to be the inducement that brought, and the tie 
that bound, the company together. It was rum that cemented 
friendship, and rum that clinched bargains; rum that kept out the 
cold of winter, and rum that moderated the summer's heat. Men 
drank it, women drank it, children drank it. There were families 
in which the first duty of every morning was to serve around to 
all its members, even to the y oungest child, a certain portion of 
alcoholic liquor. Rum had to be bought with money, and money 
was hard to get in New Hampshire. Zaccheus Greeley was not 
the man to stint his workmen. At his house and on his farm the 
jug was never empty. In his cellar the cider never was out. And 
so, by losses which he could not help, by practices which had not 
yet been discovered to be unnecessary, his affairs became disor- 
dered, and he began to descend the easy steep that leads to the 
abyss of bankruptcy. He arrived — lingered a few years on the 
edge — was pushed in — and scrambled out on the other side. 

It was on a Monday morning. There had been a long, fierce 
rain, and the clouds still hung heavy and dark over the hills. 
Horace, then only nine years old, on coming down stairs in the 
morning, saw several men about the house ; neighbors some of 
them ; others were strangers ; others he had seen in the village. 
He was too young to know the nature of an Execution, and by 
what right the sheriff and a party of men laid hands upon his 
father's property. His father had walked quietly off into the 
woods; for, at that period, a man's person was not exempt from 
seizure. Horace had a vague idea that the men had come to rob 
them of all they possessed; and wild stories are afloat in the 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 13 

neighborhood, of the boy's conduct on the occasion. Some say, 
that he seized a hatchet, ran to the neighboring field, and began 
furiously to cut down a favorite pear-tree, saying, " They shall 
not have that, anyhow." But his mother called him off, and the 
pear-tree still stands. Another story is, that he went to one of his 
mother's closets, and taking as many of her dresses as he could 
grasp in his arms, ran away with them into the woods, hid them 
behind a rock, and then came back to the house for more. Others 
assert, that the article carried off by the indignant boy was 
not dresses, but a gallon of rum. But whatever the boy did, or 
left undone, the reader may imagine that it was to all the family 
a day of confusion, anguish and horror. Both of Horace's pa- 
rents were persons of incorruptible honesty; they had striven 
hard to place such a calamity as this far from their house ; they 
had never experienced themselves, nor witnessed at their earlier 
homes, a similar scene; the blow was unexpected; and mingled 
with their sense of shame at being publicly degraded, was a feel- 
ing of honest rage at the supposed injustice of so summary a pro- 
ceeding. 

A little legal maneuvering or rascality on the part of a creditor, 
gave the finishing blow to his fortunes; and, in the winter of 1821, 
he gave up the effort to recover himself, became a bankrupt, was 
sold out of house, land and household goods by the sheriff, and fled 
from the State to avoid arrest, leaving his family behind. Horace 
was nearly ten years old. Some of the debts then left unpaid, he 
discharged in part thirty years after. 

Mr. Greeley had to begin the world anew, and the world was all 
before him, where to choose, excepting only that portion of it 
which is included within the boundaries of New Hampshire. He 
made his way, after some wandering, to the town of Westhaven, 
in Rutland county, Vermont, about a hundred and twenty miles 
northwest of his former residence. There he found a large landed 
proprietor, who had made one fortune in Boston as a merchant, 
and married another in Westhaven, the latter consisting of an ex- 
tensive tract of land. He had now retired from business, had set 
up for a country gentleman, was clearing his lands, and when they 
were cleared he rented them out in farms. This attempt to 
"found an estate," in the European style, signally failed. The 
" mansion house " has been disseminated over the neighborhood, 
one wing here, another wing there ; the " lawn " is untrimmed ; 
the attempt at a park gate has lost enough of the paint that made 
it tawdry once, to look shabby now. But this gentleman was use- 
ful to Zaccheus Greeley in the day of his poverty. He gave him 
work, rented him a small house nearly opposite the park gate just 
mentioned, and thus enabled him in a few weeks to transport his 
family to a new home. 

The family were gainers in some important particulars, by their 
change of residence. The land was better. The settlement was 



14 LIFE OV HORACE GREELEY. 

more recent. There was a better chance for a poor man to ac- 
quire proi)erty. And what is well worth mention for its effect 
upon the opening mind of Horace, the scenery was grander and 
more various. 'That part of Rutland county is in nature's large 
manner. Long ranges of hills, with bases not too steep for culti- 
vation, but rising into lofty, precipitous and fantastic summits, 
stretch away in every direction. The low-lands are level and fer- 
tile. Brooks and rivers come out from among the hills, where 
they have been officiating as water-power, and flow down through 
valleys that open and expand to receive them, fertilizing the soil. 
Roaming among these hills, the boy must have come frequently 
upon little lakes locked in on every side, without apparent outlet 
or inlet, as smooth as a mirror, as silent as the grave. Six miles 
from his father's house was the great Lake Champlain. He could 
not see it from his father's door, but he could see the blue mist 
that rose from its suuface every morning and evening, and hung 
over it a cloud veiling a mystery. And he could see the long 
line of green knoll-like hills that formed its opposite shore. And 
he could go down on Sundays to the shore itself, and stand in the 
immediate presence of the lake. Nor is it a slight thing for a boy 
to see a great natural object which he has been learning about in 
his school books; nor is it an uninfluential circumstance for him 
to live where he can see it frequently. It was a superb country 
for a boy to grow up in, whether his tendencies were industrial, or 
sportive, or artistic, or i)oetical. There was rough work enough 
to do on the land. Fish were abundant in the lakes and streams. 
Game abounded in the woods. Wild grapes and wild honey were 
to be had for the search after them. Much of the surrounding 
scenery is sublime, and what is not sublime is beautiful. More- 
over, Lake Champlain is a stage on the route of northern and 
southern travel, and living upon its shores brought the boy nearer 
to that world in which he was destined to move, and which he had 
to know before he could work in it to advantage. At Westhaven, 
Horace passed the next five years of his life. He was now rather 
tall for his age ; his mind was far in advance of it. Many of the 
opinions for which he has since done battle were distinctly formed 
during that important period of his life to which the present 
chapter is devoted. 

At Westhaven, Mr. Greeley, as they say in the country, " took 
jobs ;" and the jobs which he took were of various kinds. He 
would contract to get in a harvest, to prepare the ground for a new 
one, to " tend " a saw-mill ; but his principal employment was 
clearing up land ; that is, piling up and burning the trees after 
they had been felled. After a time he kept shecj) and cattle. In 
most of his undertakings he prosj)ercd. By incessant labor and 
by reducing his expenditures to thelowest possible point, he saved 
money, slowly but continuously. 



I. IKK OK HORACE OREELKV. 15 

In whatever he engaged, whetlier it was haying, harvesting, 
sawing, or land-clearing, he was assisted by all his family. There 
was little work to do at home, and after breakfast, the house was 
left to take care of itself, and away went the family, father,, 
mother, boys, girls and oxen, to work together. Clearing land 
offers an excellent field for family labor, as it affords work adapted 
to all degrees of strength. The father chopped the larger logs, 
and directed the labor of all the company. Horace drove the 
oxen, and drove them none too well, say the neighbors, and was 
gradually supplanted in the office of driver by his younger 
brother. Both the boys could chop the smaller trees. Their 
mother and sisters gathered together the light wood into heaps. 
And when the great logs had to be rolled upon one another, there 
was scope for the combined skill and strength of the whole party. 
Many happy and merry days the family spent together in this 
employment. The mother's spirit never flagged. Her voice rose 
in song and laughter from the tangled brush-wood in which she 
was often buried ; and no word, discordant or unkind, was ever 
known to break the perfect harmony, to interrupt the perfect good 
humor that prevailed in the family. At night they went home to 
the most primitive of suppers, and partook of it in the picturesque 
and labor-saving style in which the dinner before alluded to was 
consumed. The neighbors still point out a tract of fifty acres 
which was cleared in this sportive and Swiss-Family-Robinson- 
like manner. They show the spring on the side of the road where 
the family used to stop and drink on their way ; and they show a 
hemlock-tree, growing from the rocks above the spring, which used 
to furnish the brooms, weekly renewed, which swept the little 
house in which the little family lived. To complete the picture, 
imagine them all clad in the same material, the coarsest kind of 
linen or linen-woolsey, home-spun, dyed with butternut bark, and 
the different garments made in the roughest and simplest manner 
by the mother. 

More than three garments at the same time, Horace seldom 
wore in the summer, and these were — a straw hat, generally in a 
state of dilapidation, a tow-shirt, never buttoned, a pair of trous- 
ers made of the family material, and having the peculiarity of 
being very short in both legs, but shorter in one than the other. 
In the winter he added a pair of shoes and a jacket. During the 
five years of his life at Westhaven, probably his clothes did not 
cost three dollars a year; and, I believe, that during the whole 
period of his childhood, up to the time when he came of age, not 
fifty dollars in all were expended upon his dress. He never man- 
ifested, on any occasion, in any company, nor at any part of his 
early life, the slightest interest in his attire, nor the least care for 
its effect upon others. That amiable trait in human nature which 
inclines us to decoration, which makes us desirous to present an 
agreeable figure to others, and to abhor peculiarity in our appear- 



l6 LIKE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

ance, is a trait which Horace never gave the smallest evidence of 
possessing. 

People in those days had a high respect for the presidential 
office, and really believed — many of them did — that to get the 
highest place it was only necessary to be the greatest man. 

A story is told by one who lived at the " mansion-house " when 
Horace used to read there. Horace entered the library one day, 
when the master of the house happened to be present, in conver- 
sation with a stranger. The stranger, struck with the awkward- 
ness and singular appearance of the boy, took him for little better 
than an idiot, and was inclined to laugh at the idea of lending 
books to " such a fellow as that." The owner of the mansion de- 
fended his conduct by extolling the intelligence of his protege, 
and wound up with the usual climax, that he should " not be sur- 
prised, sir, if that boy should come to be President of the United 
States." 

Horace's last year in Westhaven (1825) wore slowly away. He 
had exhausted the schools ; he was impatient to be at the types, 
and he wearied his father with importunities to get him a place in 
a printing-office. But his father was loth to let him go, for two 
reasons ; the boy vas useful at home, and the cautious father 
feared he would not do well away from home ; he was so gentle, 
so absent, so awkward, so little calculated to make his way with 
strangers. One day the boy saw in the " Northern Spectator," a 
weekly paper, published at East Poultney, eleven miles distant, an 
advertisement for an apprentice in the office of the " Spectator " 
itself. He showed it to his father, and wrung from him a reluctant 
consent to his applying for the place. " I have'nt got time to go 
and see about it, Horace ; but if you have a mind to walk over to 
Poultney and see what you can do, why you may." 

Horace had n. mind to. 

It was a fine spring morning in the year 1826, about ten o'clock, 
when Mr. Amos Bliss, the manager, and one of the proprietors, of 
the Northern Spectator, " might have been seen " in the garden 
behind his house planting potatoes. He heard the gate open be- 
hind him, and, without turning or looking round, became dimly 
conscious of the presence of a boy. But the boys of country vil- 
lages go into whosesoever garden theirwandering fancy impels them, 
and supposing this boy to be one of his own neighbors, Mr. Bliss 
continued his work and quickly forgot that he was not alone. In 
a few minutes, he heard a voice close behind him, a strange voice, 
high-pitched and whining. 

It said, " Are you the man that carries on the printing office .''' 

Mr. Bliss then turned, and resting upon his hoe, surveyed the 
person who had thus addressed him. He saw standing before 
him a boy apparently about fifteen years of age, of a light, tall, 
and slender form, dressed in the plain, farmer's cloth of the time, 
Jiis garments cut with an utter disregard of elegance and fit. His 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. I7 

trowsers were exceedingly short and voluminous; he wore no 
stockings; his shoes were of the kind denominated "high-lows," 
and much worn down ; his hat was of felt, " one of the old stamp, 
with so small a brim that it looked more like a two-quart measure 
inverted than anything else ; " and it was worn far back on his 
head ; his hair was white, with a tinge of orange at its extremi- 
ties, and it lay thinly upon a broad forehead and over a head 
"rocking on shoulders which seemed too slender to support the 
weight of a member so disproportioned to the general outline." 
The general effect of the figure and its costume was so awkward 
they presented such a combination of the rustic and ludicrous, 
and the apparition had come upon him so suddenly, that the ami- 
able gardener could scarcely keep from laughing. 

He restrained himself, however, and replied, " Yes, I'm the 
man." 

Whereupon the stranger asked, " Don't you want a boy to learn 
the trade?" 

"Well," said Mr. Bliss, "we have been thinking of it. Do you 
want to learn to print ?" 

"I've had some notion of it," said the boy in true Yankee fash- 
ion, as though he had not been dreaming about it, and longing for 
it for years. 

Mr. Bliss was both astonished and puzzled — astonished that 
such a fellow as the boy looked to be, should have ever thought of 
learning to print, and puzzled how to convey to him an idea of the 
absurdity of the notion. So, with an expression in his counte- 
nance, such as that of a tender-hearted dry-goods merchant might 
be supposed to assume if a hod-carrier should apply for a 
place in the lace department, he said, " Well, my boy — but, you 
know, it takes considerable learning to be a printer. Have you 
been to school much .''" 

" No," said the boy, " I have'nt had much chance at school. 
I've read some." 

" What have you read.''" asked Mr. Bliss. 

"Well, I've read some history, and some travels, and a little of 
most everything." 

" Where do you live .''" 

"At Westhaven." 

" How did you come over.?" 

" I came on foot." 

" What's your name .''" 

" Horace Greeley." 

Now it happened that Mr. Amos Bliss had been for the last 
three years an Inspector of Common Schools, and in fulfilling the 
duties of his office — examining and licensing teachers — he had ac- 
quired an uncommon facility in asking questions, and a fondness 
for that exercise which men generally entertain for any employ- 
ment in which they suppose themselves to excel. The youth 



l8 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

before him wa^ — in the language of medical students — a " fresh 
subject," and the inspector proceeded to try all his skill upon him, 
advancing from easy questions to hard ones, up to those knotty 
problems with which he had been wont to " stump " candidates 
for the office of teacher. The boy was a match for him. He 
answered every question promptly, clearly and modestly. He 
could not be "stumped" in the ordinary school studies, and of 
the books he had read he could give a correct and complete analy- 
sis. In Mr. Bliss's own account of the interview, he says, " On 
entering into conversation, and a partial examination of the quali- 
fications of my new applicant, it required but little time to dis- 
cover that he possessed a mind of no common order, and an 
acquired intelligence far beyond his years. He had had but little 
opportunity at the common school, but he said "he had read 
some," and what he had read he well understood and remembered. 
In addition to the ripe intelligence manifested in one so young, 
and whose instruction had been so limited, there was a single- 
mindedness, a truthfulness and common sense in what he said, 
that at once commanded my regard." 

After half an hour's conversation with the boy, Mr. Bliss inti- 
mated that he thought he would do, and told him to go into the 
printing-office and talk to the foreman. Horace went to the print- 
ing-office, and there his appearance produced an effect on the 
tender minds of the three apprentices who were at work therein 
which can be much better imagined than described, and which is 
most vividly remembered by the two who survive. To the fore- 
man Horace addressed himself, regardless certainly, oblivious 
probably, of the stare and the remarks of the boys. The foreman, 
at first, was inclined to wonder that Mr. Bliss should, for one mo- 
ment, think it possible that a boy got up in that style could per- 
form the most ordinary duties of a printer's apprentice. Ten 
minutes' talk Avith him, however, effected a partial revolution in 
his mind in the boy's favor, and as he was greatly in want of an- 
other apprentice, he was not inclined to be over particular. He 
tore off a slip of proof paper, wrote a few words upon it hastily 
with a pencil, and told the boy to take it to Mr. Bliss. That piece 
of paper was his fate. The words were : " Guess we'd better try 
him." Away went Horace to the garden, and presented his pa- 
per. Mr. Bliss, whose curiosity had been excited to a high pitch 
by the extraordinary contrast between the appearance of the boy 
.and his real quality, now entered into a long conversation with 
him, (juestioned him respecting his history, his past employments, 
his parents, their circumstances, his own intentions and wishes ; 
and the longer he talked, the more his admiration grew. The re- 
sult was, that he agreed to accept Horace as an apprentice, pro- 
vided his father would agree to the usual terms ; and then with 
eager steps, and a light heart, the happy boy took the dusty road 
that led to bLs home in Westhaven. 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 1 9 

" You're not going to hire that tow-head, Mr. Bliss, are you .?" 
asked one of the aj)prentices at the close of the day. " I am," 
was the reply, "and if you boys expect to get any fun out of him, 
you'd better get it quick, or you'll be too late. There's something 
ill that tow-head, as you'll find out before you're a week older." 

A day or two after, Horace packed up his wardrobe in a small 
cotton handkerchief. Small as it was, it would have held more ; 
for its proprietor never had more than two shirts, and one change 
of outer-clothing, at the same time, till he was of age. Father 
and son walked, side by side, to Poultney, the boy carrying his 
possessions upon a stick over his shoulder. 

At Poultney, an unexpected difficulty arose, which for a time 
made Horace tremble in his high-low shoes. The terms proposed 
by Mr. Bliss were, that the boy should be bound for five years, and 
receive his board and twenty dollars a year. Now Mr. Greeley 
had ideas of his own on the subject of apprenticeship, and he ob- 
jected to the proposal, and to every particular of it. In the first 
place, he had determined that no child of his should ever be bound 
at all. In the second place, he thought five years an unreasonable 
time ; thirdly, he considered that twenty dollars a year and l)oard 
was a compensation ridiculously disproportionate to the services 
which Horace would be required to render ; and finally, on each 
and all of these points, he clung to his opinion with the tenacity 
of a Greeley. 

Mr. Bliss appealed to the established custom of the country; 
five years was the usual period ; the compensation offered was the 
regular thing; the binding was a point essential to the employer's 
interest. And at every pause in the conversation, the appealing 
voice of Horace was heard : " Father, I guess you'd better make 
a bargain with Mr. Bliss;" or, "Father, I guess it won't make 
much difi'erence ;" or, " Don't you think you'd better do it, father.?" 
At one moment the boy was reduced to despair. Mr. Bliss had 
given it as his ultimatum that the proposed binding was abso- 
lutely indispensable ; he "could do business in no other way." 
" Well, then, Horace," said the father, "let us go home." The 
father turned to go ; but Horace lingered ; he could not give it 
up ; and so the father turned again ; the negotiation was re-opened, 
and after a prolonged discussion, a compromise was efiected. 
What the terms were that were finally agreed to I cannot posi- 
tively state, for the three memories which I have consulted upon 
the subject give three different replies. Probably, however, they 
were — no binding, and no money for six months ; then the boy 
could, if he chose, bind himself for the remainder of the five years, 
at forty dollars a year, the apprentice to be boarded from the be- 
ginning. And so the father went home, and the son went straight 
to the printing-office and took his first lesson in the art of setting 
type. 



20 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

During the four years that Horace lived at East Poultney, he 
boarded for some time at the tavern, which still affords entertain- 
ment for man and beast — /. e. peddler and horse — in that village. 
It was kept by an estimable couple, who became exceedingly at- 
tached to their singular guest, and he to them. Their recollec- 
tions of him are to the following effect : — Horace at that time ate 
and drank whatever was placed before him ; he was rather fond 
of good living, ate furiously, and fast, and much. He was very 
fond of coffee, but cared little for tea. Every one drank in those 
days, and there was a great deal of drinking at the tavern, but 
Horace never could be tempted to taste a drop of anything intox- 
icating. " I always," said the kind landlady, " took a great inter- 
est in young people, and when I saw they were going wrong, it 
used to distress me, no matter whom they belonged to ; but I 
never feared for Horace. Whatever might be going on about the 
village or in the bar-room, I always knew //^ would do right." He 
stood on no ceremony at the table; \\q fell to without waiting to 
be asked or helped, devoured everything right and left, stopped 
as suddenly as he had begun, and vanished instantly. One day, 
as Horace was stretching his long arm over to the other side of 
the table in quest of a distant dish, the servant, wishing to hint to 
him, in a jocular manner, that that was not exactly the most proper 
way of proceeding, said, " Don't trouble yourself, Horace, / want 
to help you to that dish, for, you know, I have :>. particular regard 
for you." He blushed, as only a boy with a very white face can 
blush, and, thenceforth, was less adventurous in exploring the re- 
moter portions of the table-cloth. When any topic of interest was 
started at the table, he joined in it with the utmost confidence, 
and maintained his opinion against anybody, talking with great 
vivacity, and never angrily. He came, at length, to be regarded 
as a sort of Town Encyclopaedia, and if anybody wanted to know 
anything, he went, as a matter of course, to Horace Greeley; and, 
if a dispute arose between two individuals, respecting a point of 
history, or politics, or science, they referred it to Horace Greeley ; 
and whomsoever ]ie declared to be right, was confessed to be the 
victor in the controversy. Horace never went to a tea-drinking 
or a party of any kind, never went on an excursion, never slept 
away from home or was absent from one meal during the period 
of his residence at the tavern, except when he went to visit his 
parents. He seldom went to church, but spent the Sunday, usu- 
ally, in reading. He was a stanch Universalist, a stanch whig, a 
pre-eminently stanch anti-Mason. Thus, the landlord and land- 
lady. 

One evening in November, when business was urgent, and all 
the men worked till late in the evening, Horace, instead of re- 
turning immediately after tea, as his custom was, was absent from 
the office for two hours. Between eight and nine, when by chance 
all the men were gathered about the " composing stone," upon 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 21 

which a strong light was thrown, a strange figure entered the 
office, a tall gentleman, dressed in a complete suit of faded broad- 
cloth, and a shabby, over-brushed beaver hat, from beneath which 
depended long and snowy locks. The garments were fashionably 
cut ; the coat was in the style of a swallow's tail ; the figure was 
precisely that of an old gentleman who had seen better days. It 
advanced from the darker parts of the office, and emerged slowly 
into the glare around the composing stone. The men looked in- 
quiringly. The figure spread out its hands, looked down at its 
habiliments with an air of infinite complacency, and said, — 

" Well, boys, and how do you like me now .'*" 

"Why, it's Greeley !" screamed one of the men. 

It 7C'(7s Greeley, metamorphosed into a decayed gentleman by a 
second-hand suit of black, bought of a Chatham-street Jew for 
five dollars. 

A shout arose, such as had never before been heard at staid and 
regular 85 Chatham-street. Cheer upon cheer was given, and men 
laughed till the tears came, the venerable gentleman being as 
Jiappy as the happiest. 

"Greeley, you must treat upon ///^?/ suit, and no mistake," said one. 

" Oh, of course," said everybody else. 

"Come along, boys ; I'll treat," was Horace's ready response. 

All the company repaired to the old grocery on the corner of 
Deane-street, and there each individual partook of the beverage 
that pleased him, the treater indulging in a glass of spruce beer. 
Posterity may as well know, and take warning from the fact, that 
this five-dollar suit was a failure. It had been worn thin, and had 
been washed in blackened water and ironed smooth. A week's 
wear brought out all its pristine shabbiness, and developed new. 

Much of this is curiously confirmed by a story often told in 
convivial moments by a distinguished physician of New York, who 
on one occasion chanced to witness at the Poultney tavern the 
exploits, gastronomic and encyclopaedic, to which allusion has just 
been made. " Did I ever tell you," he is wont to begin, " how and 
Avhere I first saw my friend Horace Greeley.''" Well, thus it hap- 
pened. It was one of the proudest and happiest days of my life. 
I was a country boy then, a farmer's son, and we lived a few miles 
from East Poultney. On the day in question I was sent by my 
father to sell a load of potatoes at the store in East Poultney, and 
bring back various commodities in exchange. Now this was the 
first time, you must know, that I had ever been entrusted with so 
important an errand. I had been to the village with my father 
often enough, but now I was to go alone, and I felt as proud and 
independent as a midshipman the first time he goes ashore in 
command of a boat. Big with the fate of twenty bushels of pota- 
toes, off I drove — reached the village — sold out my load, drove 
round to the tavern — put up my horses, and went in to dinner.' 
This going to the tavern on my own account, all by myself, and 



22 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

paying my own bill, was, I thought, the crowning glory of the 
whole adventure. 

There were a good many people at dinner, the sheriff of the 
county and an ex-member of Congress among them, and I felt 
considerably abashed at first ; but I had scarcely begun to eat, 
when my eyes fell upon an object so singular that I could do little 
else than stare at it all the while it remained in the room. It was 
a tall, pale, white-haired, gawky boy, seated at the further end of 
the table. He was in his shirt-sleeves, and he was eating with a 
rapidity and awkwardness that I never saw equaled before nor 
since. It seemed as if he was eating for a wager, and had gone 
in to win. He neither looked up nor round, nor appeared to pay 
the least attention to the conversation. My first thought was, 
" This is a pretty sort of a tavern to let such a fellow as that sit 
at the same table with all these gentlemen ; he ought to come in 
with the hostler." I thought it strange, too, that no one seemed 
to notice him, and I supposed he owed his continuance at the table 
to that circumstance alone. And so I sat, eating little myself, and 
occupied in watching the wonderful performance of this wonder- 
ful youth. At length the conversation at the table became quite 
animated, turning upon some measure of an early Congress ; and 
a question arose how certain members had voted on its final pass- 
age. There was a difference of opinion ; and the sheriff, a very 
finely-dressed personage, I thought, to my boundless astonishment, 
referred the matter to the unaccountable boy, saying, " Ain't that 
right, Greeley.''" " No," said the unaccountable, without looking 
up, "you're wrong." " There," said the ex-member, " I told you 
so." " And you're wrong, too," said the still-devouring mystery. 
Then he laid down his knife and fork, and gave the history of the 
measure, explained the state of parties at the time, stated the vote 
in dispute, named the leading advocates and opponents of the 
bill, and, in short, gave a complete exposition of the whole mat- 
ter,, I listened and wondered ; but what surprised me most was, 
that the company received his statement as pure gospel, and as 
settling the cpiestion beyond dispute — as a dictionary settles a dis- 
pute respecting the spelling of a word. A minute after, the boy 
left the dining-room, and I never saw him again, till I met him, 
years after, in the streets of New York, when I claimed acquaint- 
ance with him as a brother Vermonter, and told him this story, tO' 
his great amusement. 

He finished his apprenticeship an uncontaminated young man,, 
with the means of independence at his fingers' end, ashamed of 
no honest employment — no decent habitation — no cleanly garb. 

"Well, Horace, and where are you going now .?" asked the kind! 
landlady of the tavern, as Horace, a {qw days after the closing of 
the printing-oftice, appeared on the piazza, equipped for the road — 
/. e., with his jacket on, and with his bujidle and stick in his 
hand. 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY, • 2^ 

"I am going," was the prompt and sprightly answer, "to Penn- 
sylvania, to see my father." 

With these words, Horace laid down the bundle and the stick, 
and took a seat for the last time on that piazza, the scene of many 
a peaceful triumj)h, where, as Political Gazetteer, he had often 
given the information that he alone, of all the town, could give ; 
where, as political partisan, he had often brought an antagonist to 
extremities ; where, as oddity, he had often fixed the gaze and 
twisted the neck of the passing peddler. 

And was there no demonstration of feeling at the departure of 
so distinguished a personage ? There was. But it did not take 
the form of a silver dinner-service, nor of a gold tea ditto, nor of a 
piece of plate, nor even of a gold pen, nor yet of a series of reso- 
lutions. While Horace sat on the piazza, talking with his old 
friends, who gathered around him, a meeting of two individuals 
was held in the corner of the bar-room. They were the landlord and 
one of his boarders; and the subject of their deliberations were, 
an old brown overcoat belonging to the latter. The landlord had 
the floor, and his speech was to the following purport : — " He felt 
like doing something for Horace before he went. Horace was an 
entirely unspeakable person. He had lived a long time in the 
house ; he had never given any trouble, and we feel for him as for 
our own son. Now, there is that brown over-coat of yours. It's 
cold on the canal, all the summer, in the mornings and evenings. 
Horace is poor and his father is poor. You are owing me a little, 
as much as the old coat is worth, and what I say is, let us give the 
poor fellow the overcoat, and call our account squared." This 
feeling oration was received with every demonstration of approval, 
and the proposition was carried into effect forthwith The land- 
lady gave him a pocket Bible. In a few minutes more, Horace 
rose, i)ut his stick through his little red bundle, and both over his 
shoulder, took the overcoat upon his other arm, said "Good-by," 
to his friends, promised to write as soon as he was settled again, 
and set off upon his long journey. His good friends of the tav- 
ern followed him with their eyes, until a turn of the road hid the 
bent and shambling figure from their sight, and then they turned 
away to ])raise him and to wish him well. Thirty years have 
passed ; and, to this hour, they do not tell the tale of his depart- 
ure without a certain swelling of the heart, without a certain glist- 
ening of the softer pair of eyes. 

Horace staid at home for several weeks, assisting his father, fish- 
ing occasionally and otherwise amusing himself; and then one 
morning, he walked over to Jamestown, a town twenty miles dis- 
tant, where a newspaper was struggling to get published, and ap- 
plied for work. Work he obtained. It was very freely given ; but 
at the end of the week the workman received a promise to pay, 
but no payment. He waited and worked four days longer, and 
discovering by that time that there really was no money to be had 



24 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

or hoped for in Jamestown, he walked home again, as poor as 
before. 

He remained at home a few days, and then set out again on his 
travels in search of some one who could pay him wages for his 
work. He took a " bee line " through the woods for the town of 
Erie, thirty miles off, on the shores of the great lake. He had ex- 
hausted the smaller towns; Erie was the last possible move in that 
corner of the board ; and upon Erie he fixed his hopes. There 
were two printing-offices, at that time, in the place. It was a town 
of five thousand inhabitants, and of extensive lake and inland 
trade. 

The gentleman still lives who saw the weary pedestrian enter 
Erie, attired in the homespun, abbreviated and stockingless style 
with which the reader is already acquainted. His old black felt 
hat slouched down over his shoulders in the old fashion. The red 
cotton handkerchief still contained his Avardrobe, and it was car- 
ried on the same old stick. The country frequenters of Erie 
were then, and are still, particularly rustic in appearance; but our 
hero seemed the very embodiment and incarnation of the rustic 
principle; and among the crowd of Pennsylvania farmers that 
thronged the streets, he swung along, pre-eminent and peculiar, a 
marked person, the observed of all observers. He, as was his 
wont, observed nobody, but went at once to the ofiice of the Erie 
Gazette, a weekly paper, published then and still by Joseph M. 
Sterrett. 

" I was not," Judge Sterrett is accustomed to relate, " I was not 
in the printing office when he arrived. I came in, soon after, and 
saw him sitting at the table reading the newspapers, and so ab- 
sorbed in them that he paid no attention to my entrance. My 
first feeling was one of astonishment, that a fellow so singularly 
" green " in his appearance should be reading, and above all, read- 
ing so intently. I looked at him for a few moments, and then, 
finding that he made no movement towards acquainting me with 
his business, I took up my composing stick and went to work. He 
continued to read for twenty minutes, or more; when he got 
up, and coming close to my case, asked, in his peculiar, whining 
voice, 

" Do you want any help in the printing business .''' 

" Why," said I, running my eye involuntarily up and down the 
extraordinary figure, "did_)'<?/z ever work at the trade.?" 

" Yes," was the reply; " I worked some at it in an office in Ver- 
mont, and I should be willing to work under instruction, if you 
could give me a job." 

Now Mr. Sterrett did want help in the printing business, and 
could have given him a job ; but, unluckily, he misinterpreted 
this modest reply. He at once concluded that the timid applicant 
was a runaway apprentice ; and runaway apprentices are a class 
of their fellow-creatures to whom employers cherish a common 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 25 

and decided aversion. Without communicating his suspicions, he 
merely said that he had no occasion for further assistance, and 
Horace, without a word, left the apartment. 

A similar reception and the same result awaited him at the other 
office ; and so the poor wanderer trudged home again, not in the 
best spirits. 

" Two or three weeks after this interview," continues Judge Ster- 
rett — he zVa judge, I saw him on the bench — " an acquaintance of 
mine, a farmer, called at the office, and inquired if I wanted a 
journeyman. I did. He said a neighbor of his had a son who 
learned the printing business somewhere Down East, and wanted 
a place. "What sort of a looking fellow is he.-'" said I. He de- 
scribed him, and I knew at once that he was my supposed runa- 
way apprentice. My friend, the farmer, gave him a high charac- 
ter, however; so I said, " Send him along," and a day or two after 
along he came." 

The terms on which Horace Greeley entered the office of the 
Erie Gazette were of his own naming, and therefore peculiar. He 
would do the best he could, he said, and Mr. Sterrett might pay 
him what he (Mr. Sterrett) thought he had earned. He had only 
one request to make, and that was, that he should not be required 
to work at the press, unless the office was so much hurried that 
his services in that department could not be dispensed with. 

In a few days, the new comer was in high favor at the office of 
the Erie Gazette. He is remembered there as a remarkably cor- 
rect and reliable compositor, though not a rapid one, and his 
steady devotion to his work enabled him to accomplish more than 
faster vv'orkmen. He was soon placed by his employer on the 
footing of a regular journeyman, at the usual wages, twelve dol- 
lars a month and board. All the intervals of labor he spent in 
reading. As soon as the hour of cessation arrived, he would hurry 
off his apron, wash his hands, and lose himself in his book or his 
newspapers, often forgetting his dinner, and often forgetting 
whether he had had his dinner or not. More and more, he be- 
came absorbed in politics. It is said, by one who worked beside 
him at Erie, that he could tell the name, post office address, and 
something of the history and political leanings, of every member 
of Congress; and that he could give the particulars of every im- 
portant election that had occurred within his recollection, even, in 
some instances, to the county majorities. 

At the end of the seventh month, the man whose sickness had 
made a temporary vacancy in the office of the Gazette, returned 
to his place, and there was, in consequence, no more work for 
Horace Greeley. Upon thesettlement of his account, it appeared 
that he had drawn, for his personal expenses during his residence 
at Erie, the sum of six dollars ! Of the remainder of his wages, 
he took about fifteen dollars in money, and the rest in a form of a 
note ; and with all this wealth in his pocket, he walked once more 



2$ LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

to his father's house. This note the generous fellow gave to his 
father, reserving the money to carry on his own personal warfare 
with the world. 

And now, Horace was tired of dallying with fortune in country 
printing offices. He said he thought it was time to i/o something, 
and he formed the bold resolution of going straight to New York 
and seeking his fortune in the metropolis. After a few days of 
recreation at home, he tied up his bundle once more, put his money 
in his pocket, and plunged into the woods in the direction of the 
Erie canal. 

He took the canal boat at Buffalo and came as far as Lockport, 
whence he walked a few miles to Claines, and staid a day at the 
house of a friend whom he had known in Vermont. Next morn- 
ing he walked back, accompanied by his friend, to the canal, and 
both of them waited many hours for an eastward-bound boat to 
pass. Night came, but no boat, and the adventurer persuaded 
his friend to go home, and set out himself to walk on the tow-path 
towards Albion. It was a very dark night. He walked slowly on, 
hour after hour, looking anxiously behind him for the expected 
boat, looking more anxiously before him to discern the two fiery 
eyes of the boats bound to the west in time to avoid being swept 
into the canal by the tow-line. Towards morning, a boat of the 
slower sort, a scow probably, overtook him ; he went on board, 
and tired with his long walk, lay down in the cabin to rest. Sleep 
was tardy in alighting upon his eye-lids, and he had the pleasure 
of hearing his merits and his costume fully and freely discussed 
by his fellow passengers. It was Monday morning. One passen- 
ger explained the coming on board of the stranger at so unusual 
an hour, by suggesting that he had been cotirti}jg all night. (Sun- 
day evening in country places is sacred to love). His appearance 
was so exceedingly unlike that of a lover, that this sally created 
much amusement, in which the wakeful traveler shared. At Roch- 
ester he took a faster boat. Wednesday night he reached Schenec- 
tady ; left the canal and walked to Albany, as the canal between 
those two towns is much obstructed by locks. He reached Albany on 
Thursday morning, just in time to see the seven o'clock steam- 
boat move out into the stream. He, therefore, took passage in a 
tow-boat which started at ten o'clock on the same morning. At 
sunrise on Friday, the i8th of August, 1831, Horace Greeley 
landed at Whitehall, close to the Battery, in the city of New York. 

Of solid cash, his stock was ten dollars. His other property 
consisted of the clothes he wore, the clothes he carried in his 
small bundle, and the stick with which he carried it. The clothes 
he wore need not be described; they were those which had already 
astonished the people of Erie. The clothes he carried were very 
few, and precisely similar in cut and quality to the garments which 
he exhibited to the public. On the violent supposition that his 
wardrobe could in any case have become a salable commodity, we 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 27 

may compute that he was worth, on this Friday morning at sun- 
rise, ten dollars and seventy-five cents. He had no friend, no 
accjuaintance here. There was not a human being upon whom he 
had any claim for help or advice. His appearance was all against 
him. He looked in his round jacket like an overgrown boy. No 
one was likely to observe the engaging beauty of his face, or the 
noble round of his brow under that overhanging hat, over that 
long and stooping body. He was somewhat timorous in his inter- 
course with strangers. He would not intrude upon their atten- 
tion; he had not the faculty of pushing his way, and proclaiming 
his merits and his desires. To the arts by which men are concil- 
iated, by which unwilling ears are forced to attend to an unwel- 
come tale, he was utterly a stranger. Moreover, he had neglected 
to bring with him any letters of recommendation, or any certifi- 
cate of his skill as a printer. It had not occurred to him that 
anything of the kind was necessary, so unacquainted was he with 
the life of cities. 

His first employment was to find a boarding-house where he 
could live a long time on a small sum. Leaving the green Bat- 
tery on his left hand, he strolled off into Broad street, and at the 
corner of that street and Wall discovered a house that in his eyes 
had the aspect of a cheap tavern, He entered the bar-room, and 
asked the price of board. 

"I guess we're too high for you," said the bar-keeper, after be- 
stowing one glance upon the inquirer. 

" Well, how much a week do you charge?" 

" Six dollars." 

" Yes, that's more than I can afford," said Horace with a laugh 
at the enormous mistake he had made in inquiring at a house of 
such pretensions. 

He turned up Wall street, and sauntered into Broadway. See- 
ing no house of entertainment that seemed at all suited to his 
circumstances, he sought the water once more, and wandered 
along the wharves of the North River as far as Washington market. 
Boarding-houses of the cheapest kind, and drinking-houses of 
the lowest grade, the former frequented chiefly by emigrants, the 
latter by sailors, were numerous enough in that neighborhood. 
A house, which combined the low groggery and the cheap board- 
ing-house in one small establishment, kept by an Irishman named 
M'Gorlick, chanced to be the one that first attracted the rover's 
attention. It looked so mean and squalid, that he was tempted 
to enter, and again inquire for what sum a man could buy a week's 
shelter and sustenance. 

" Twenty shillings," was the landlord's reply. 

"Ah," said Horace, "that sounds more like it." 

He engaged to board with Mr. M'Gorlick on the instant, and 
proceeded soon to test the quality of his fare by taking breakfast 



28 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

in the nosom of his family. The cheapness of the entertainment 
was its best recommendation. 

After breakfast Horace performed an act which I believe he 
had never spontaneously performed before. He bought some 
clothes, with a view to render himself more presentable. They 
Avere of the commonest kind, and the garments were few, but the 
purchase absorbed nearly half his capital. Satisfied with his ap- 
pearance, he now began the round of the printing offices, going 
into every one he could find and asking for employment — 
merely asking, and going away, without a Avord, as soon as he 
was refused. In the course of the morning he found himself in 
the office of the Journal of Commerce, and he chanced to direct 
his incjuiry, " if they wanted a hand," to the late David Hale, one 
of the proprietors of the paper. Ivlr. Hale took a survey of the 
person who had presumed to address him, and replied in substance 
as follows: 

'* My opinion is, young man, that you 're a run away apprentice, 
and you 'd better go home to your master." 

Horace endeavored to explain his position and circumstances, 
but the impetuous Hale could be brought to no more gracious 
response than, " Be off about your business, and don't bother us." 

Horace, more amused than indignant, retired, and pursued his 
way to the next office. All that day he walked the streets, 
climbed into upper stories, came down again, ascended other 
heights, descended, dived into basements, traversed passages, 
groped through labyrinths, ever asking the same question, " Do 
you want a hand V and ever receiving the same reply, in various de- 
grees of civility, " No." He walked ten times as many miles as he 
needed, for he was not aware that nearly all the printing offices 
in New York are in the same square mile. He went the entire 
length of many streets which any body could have told him did 
not contain one. 

He went home on Friday evening very tired and a little dis- 
couraged. 

Early on Saturday morning he resumed the search, and con- 
tinued it with energy till the evening. But no one wanted a hand. 
Business seemed to be at a stand-still, or every office had its full 
complement of men. On Saturday evening he was still more 
fatigued. He resolved to remain in the city a day or two longer, 
and then, if still unsu(Scessful, to turn his face homeward, and 
inquire for work at the towns through which he passed. Though 
discouraged, he was not disheartened, and still less alarmed. 

In the afternoon he heard news which gave him a faint hope 
of being able to remain in the city. An Irishman, a friend of the 
landlord, came in the course of the afternoon to pay his usual 
Sunday visit, and became acquainted with Horace and his fruit- 
less search for work. He was a shoemaker, I believe, but he 
lived in a house which was much frequented by journeymen 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 2(> 

printers. From them he had heard that hands were wanted at 
West's, No. 85 Chatham street, and he recommended his new 
aci}uaintance to make immediate application at that ofifice. 

Accusiomed to country hours, and eager to seize the chance^ 
Horace was in Chatham street and on the steps of the designated 
liouse by half-past five on Monday morning. West's printing 
office was in the second story, the ground floor being occupied 
l)y McElrath& Bangs as a bookstore. They were publishers, and 
AVest was their printer. Neither store nor office was yet opened, 
and Horace sat down on the steps to wait. 

It seemed very long before any one came to work that morning 
at No. 85. The steps on which our friend was seated were in the 
narrow part of Chatham street, the gorge through which at morn- 
ing and evening the swarthy tide of mechanics pours. By six 
o'clock the stream has set strongly down-town-ward, and it grad- 
ually swells to a torrent, bright with tin kettles. Thousands 
passed by, but no one stopped till nearly seven o'clock, when 
one of Mr. West's journeymen arrived, and finding the door still 
locked, he sat down on the steps by the side of Horace Greeley. 
They fell into conversation, and Horace stated his circumstances, 
something of his history, and his need of employment. Luckily 
this journeyman was a Vermonter, and a kind-hearted, intelligent 
man. He looked upon Horace as a countryman, and was 
struck with the singular candor and artlessness with which he 
told his tale. " I saw," says he, " that he was an honest, good 
young man, and being a Vermonter myself, I determined to help 
him if I could." 

He did help him. The doors were opened, the men began to 
arrive ; Horace and his newly-found friend ascended to the ofifice, 
and soon after seven the work of the day began. It is hardly 
necessary to say that the appearance of Horace, as he sat in the 
office waiting for the coming of the foreman, excited unbounded, 
astonishment, and brought upon his friend a variety of satirical 
observations. Nothing daunted, however, on the arrival of the 
foreman he stated the case, and endeavored to interest him enough 
in Horace to give him a trial. It happened that the work for 
which a man was wanted in the ofifice was the composition of a 
Polyglot Testament ; a kind of work which is extremely difficult 
and tedious. Several men had tried their hand at it, and, in a few 
days or a few hours, given it up. The foreman looked at Horace, 
and Horace looked at the foreman. Horace saw a handsome man 
(now known to the sporting public as Colonel Porter, editor of 
the Spirit of the Times). The foreman beheld a youth who 
could have gone on the stage, that minute, as Ezekiel Homespun 
without the alteration of a thread or a hair, and brought down 
the house by his "getting up" alone. He no more believed 
that Ezekiel could set up a page of a Polyglot Testament than 
he ^could construct a chronometer. However, partly to oblige 



30 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

Horace's friend, partly because he was unwilling to wound the 
feelings of the applicant by sending him abruptly away, he con- 
sented to let him try. " Fix up a case for him," said he, "and 
we'll see if he can do anything." In a few minutes Horace Avas 
at work. 

After Horace had been at work an hour or two, Mr. West, 
the " boss" came into the office. What his feelings were when 
he saw his new man, may be inferred from a little conver- 
sation upon the subject which took place between him and the 
foreman 

" Did you hire that fool.''" asked West with no small irri- 
tation. 

"Yes; we must have hands, and he 's the best I could get," 
said the foreman, justifying his conduct, though he was really 
ashamed of it. 

"Well," said the master, "for God's sake pa" him off to-night 
and let him go about his business." 

Horace worked through the day with his usual intensity, and in 
perfect silence. At night he presented to the foreman, as the cus- 
tom then was, the " proof " of his day's work. What astonishment 
was depicted in the good-looking countenance of that gentleman 
when he discovered that the proof before him was greater in 
quantity, and more correct than that of any other day's work which 
had yet been done on the Polyglot ! There was no thought of 
sending the new journeyman about his business now. 

Horace Greeley was a journeyman printer in New York city for 
fourteen months. Those months need not detain us long from the 
more eventful periods of his life. 

He worked for Mr. West in Chatham street till about the first 
of November ( 1 83 1 ). Then the business of that office fell off, and 
he was again a seeker for employment. He obtained a place in 
the office of the Evening Post, whence, it is said^ he was soon dis- 
missed by the late Mr. Leggett, on the ground of his sorry appear- 
ance. The story current among printers is this : Mr. Leggett 
came into the printing office for the purpose of speaking to the 
man whose place Horace Greeley had taken. 

"Where's Jones.?" asked Mr. Leggett. 

" He's gone away," replied one of the men. 

"Who has taken his place, then.?" said the irritable editoi. 

"There's the man," said some one, pointing to Horace, who was 
"bobbing" at the case in his peculiar way. 

Mr. Leggett looked at " the man," and said to the foreman, 
"For God's sake, discharge him, and let's have decent-Z^^-^vV;^ men 
in the office, at least." 

Horace was accordingly — so goes the story — discharged at the 
end of the week. 

Horace Greeley's first lift happened after this wise : 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 31 

About the year 1830, Mr, Sheppard, recently come of age and 
into the possession of fifteen hundred dollars, moved from his na- 
tive New Jersey to New York, and entered the Eldridge Street 
Medical School as a student of medicine. He was ambitious and 
full of ideas. Of course, therefore, his fifteen hundred dollars 
burned in his vest pocket — (where he actually used to carry it, 
until a fellow student almost compelled him to deposit it in a place 
of safety). He took to dabbling in newspapers and periodicals, a 
method of getting rid of superfluous cash, which is as expeditious 
as it is fascinating. He soon had an interest in a medical maga- 
zine, and soon after, a share in a weekly paper. By the time he 
had completed his medical studies, he had gained some insight 
into the nature of the newspaper business, and lost the greater 
part of his money 

People who live in Eldridge street, when they have occasion to 
go " down town," must necessarily pass through Chatham street, a 
thoroughfare which is noted, among many other things, for the 
extraordinary number of articles which are sold in it for a " penny 
a piece." Apple-stalls, peanut-stalls, stalls for the sale of oranges, 
melons, pine-apples, cocoanuts, chestnuts, candy, shoe-laces, cakes, 
pocket-combs, ice-cream, suspenders, lemonade, and oysters, line 
the sidewalk. In Chatham street, those small trades are carried 
on, on a scale of magnitude, with a loudness of vociferation, and a 
flare of lamp-light, unknown to any other part of the town. Along 
Chatham street, our medical student ofttimes took his way, musing 
on the instability of fifteen hundred dollars, and observing, possi- 
bly envying, the noisy merchants of the stalls. He was struck 
with the rapidity with which they sold their penny ware. 
A small boy would sell half a dozen penny cakes in the course of 
a minute. The difference between a cent and no money did not 
seem to be appreciated by the people. If a person saw some- 
thing, wanted it, knew the price to be only a cent, he was almost 
as certain to buy it as though it were offered him for nothing. 
Now, thought he, to make a fortune, one has nothing more to do 
than to produce a tempting article which can be sold profitably 
for a cent, place it where everybody can see it, and buy it, with- 
out stopping — and lo ! the thing is done ! If it were only possible 
to produce a small, spicy daily paper for a cent, and get boys to 
sell it about the streets, how it would sell ! How many pennies 
that now go for cakes and peanuts would be spent for news and 
paragraphs ! 

He went to a paper warehouse, and made inquiries touching the 
price of the cheaper kinds of pjrinting paper. He figured up the 
cost of composition. He computed office expenses and editorial 
salaries. He estimated the probable circulation of a penny paper, 
and the probable income to be derived from advertising. Surely, 
he could sell four or five thousand a day ! T/ierc, for instance, is 
a group of people ; suppose a boy were at this moment to go up 



32 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

to thon with an armful of papers, "only one cent," I am positive, 
thought the sanguine projector, that six of the nine would buy a 
copy ! His conclusion was, that he could produce a newspaper 
about twice the size of an average sheet of letter-paper, half para- 
graphs and half advertisements, and sell it at a cent per copy, 
Avith an am])le profit to himself. He was sure of it ! He had tried 
all his arithmetic upon the project, and the figures gave the same 
result always. 

The Spirit of the Times was then in its infancy. To the office 
of that paper, where Horace Greeley was then a journeyman, Mr. 
Sheppard first directed his steps, and there he first unfolded his 
plans and exhibited his calculations. Mr. Greeley was not pres- 
ent on his first entrance. He came soon after, and began telling- 
in high glee a story he had picked up of old Isaac Hill, who used 
to read his speeches in the House, and one day brought the wrong 
speech, and got upon his legs, and half way into a swelling exor- 
dium before he discovered his mistake. The narrator told his 
story extremely well, taking off the embarrassment of the old 
gentleman as he gradually came to the knowledge of his misfor- 
tune, to the life. The company were highly amused, and Mr. 
Sheppard said to himself, "That's no common boy.'' Perhaps it 
was an unfortunate moment to introduce a bold and novel idea ; 
but it is certain that every individual present, from the editor tO' 
the devil, regarded the notion of a penny paper as one of extreme 
absurdity — foolish, ridiculous, frivolous ! They took it as a joke, 
and the schemer took his leave. 

Despairing of getting the assistance he required. Dr. Sheppard 
resolved, at length, to make a desperate effort to start the paper 
himself. His means were fifty dollars in cash and a promise of 
credit for two hundred dollars' worth of paper. Among his 
printer friends was Mr. Francis Story, the foreman of the Spi'rit 
of the Times office, who, about that time, was watching for an op- 
portunity to get into business on his own account. To him Dr. 
Sheppard announced his intention, and proposed that he should 
establish an office and print the forthcoming paper, offering to pay 
the bill for composition every Saturday. Mr. Story hesitated; 
but, on obtaining from Mr. Sylvester a promise of the printing of 
his Bank Note Reporter, he embraced Dr. Sheppard's proposal, 
and offered Horace Greeley, for whom he had long entertained a 
warm friendship and a great admiration, an equal share in the en- 
terprise. Horace was not favorably impressed with Dr. Shep- 
pard's scheme. In the first place, he had no great faith in the 
practical ability of that gentleman ; and, secondly, he was of opin- 
ion that the smallest price for which a daily paper could be prof- 
itably sold was two cents. His arguments on the latter point 
did not convince the ardent doctor ; but, with the hope of over- 
coming his scruples and enlisting his co-operation, he consented 
to give up his darling idea, and fix the price of his paper at two 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. ;^;^ 

cents, Horace Greeley agreed, at length, to try his fortune as 
a master printer, and in December, the firm of Greeley and Story 
was formed. 

On the morning of January ist, 1833, the Morning Post, and. a 
snow-storm of almost unexampled fury, came upon the town to- 
gether. The snow was a wet blanket upon the hopes of newsboys 
and carriers, and quite deadened the noise of the new paper, 
filling up areas, and burying the tiny sheet at the doors of its few 
subscribers. For several days the streets were obstructed with 
snow. It was very cold. There were few people in the streets, 
and those few were not easily tempted to stop and fumble in their 
pockets for two cents. The newsboys were soon discouraged, and 
were fain to run shivering home. Dr. Shejjpard was wholly unac- 
([uainted with the details of editorship, and most of the labor of 
getting up the numbers fell upon Mr. Greeley, and they were pro- 
duced under every conceivable disadvantage. Yet, with all these 
misfortunes and drawbacks, several hundred copies were daily 
sold, and Dr. Sheppard was able to pay all the expenses of the 
first week. On the second Saturday, however, he paid his i)rint- 
ers half in money and half in j^romises. On the third day of the 
third week the faith and the patience of Messrs. Greeley and 
Story gave out, and the Morning Post ceased to exist. 

The firm of Greeley and Story was not seriously injured by the 
failure of the Morning Post. They stopped printing it in time, 
and their loss was not mere than fifty or sixty dollars. Meanwhile, 
their mainstay was Sylvester's Bank Note Reporter, which yielded 
about fifteen dollars' worth of composition a week, payment for 
which was sure and regular. In a few weeks Mr. Story was for- 
tunate enough to procure a considerable quantity of lottery printing. 
This was profitable work, and the firm, thenceforth, paid particu- 
lar attention to that branch of business, and our hero acquired 
great dexterity in setting up and arranging the list of prizes and 
drawings. 

Greeley and Story were now ])rosperous printers. Their busi- 
ness steadily increased, and they began to accumulate capital. 
The term of their co-partnership, ho>vever, was short. The great 
dissolver of partnerships. King Death himself, dissolved theirs in 
the seventh month of its exisience. On the 9th of July Francis 
Story went down the bay on an excursion, and never returned 
alive. He was drowned by the upsetting of a boat, and his body 
was brought back to the city the same evening. There had ex- 
isted between these young partners a warm friendship. Mr. Story's 
admiration of the character and talents of our hero amounted to 
enthusiasm ; and he, on his part, could not but love the man who 
so loved him. When he went up to the coffin to look for the last 
time on the marble features that had never turned to his with an 
unkind expression, he said, " Poor Story ! shall I ever meet with 
any one who will bear with me as he did ?" To the bereaved family 



34 LlfE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

Horace Greeley behaved with the most scrupulous justice, sending 
Mr. Story's mother half of all the little outstanding accounts as 
soon as they were ])aid, and receiving into the vacant place a 
brother-in-law of his deceased partner, Mr. Jonas Winchester, a 
gentleman now well known to the press and the people of this 
country. 

It will, perhaps, surprise some of his present readers, who know 
him only as one of the most practical of writers, one given to pol- 
itics, sub-soil jjIows, and other subjects supposed tobe unpoetical, 
to learn that he was in early life a very frequent and by no means 
altogether unsuccessful poetizer. 

Only one of his poems seems to have been inspired by the ten- 
der passion. It is dated May 31st, 1834. Who this bright Vision 
was to whom the poem was addressed, or whether it was ever 
visible to any but the poet's eye, has not transpired. 



F A N 1' A S I E S. 



They deem me cold, the thoughtless and light-hearted, 

In that I worship) not at beauty's shrine; 
They deem me cold, that through the years departed, 

I ne'er have bov/ed me to some form divine. 
They deem me proud, that, where the world hath flattered, 

I ne'er have knelt to languish or adore ; 
They think not that the homage idly scattered 

Leaves the heart bankrupt ere its spring is o'er. 

No ! in my soul there glows but one bright vision. 

And o'er my heart there rules but one fond spell, 
Bright'ning my hours of sleep with dreams Elysian 

Of one unseen, yet loved, aye, cherished well ; 
Unseen .'* Ah ! no ; her presence round me lingers, 

Chasing each wayward thought that tempts to rove ; 
Weaving Affection's web with fairy fingers, 

And waking thoughts of purity and love. 

Star of my heaven ! thy beams shall guide me ever, 

Though clouds obscure, and thorns bestrew my path • 
As sweeps my bark adown life's arrowy river 

Thy angel smile shall soothe misfortune's wrath ; 
And ah ! should Fate e'er speed her deadliest arrow, 

Should Vice allure to plunge in her dark sea, 
Be this the only shield my soul shall borrow — 

One glance to Heaven — one burning thought of thee! 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 35 

In the beginning of the year 1S34, the dream of editorship re- 
vived in the soul of Horace Greeley. A project for starting a 
weekly paper began to be agitated in the office. The firm then 
consisted of three members, Horace Greeley, Jonas "Winchester 
and E. Sibbett. 

The New Yorker never, during the seven years of its existence, 
became profitable ; and its editor, during the greater part of the 
time, derived even his means of subsistence either from the busi- 
ness of job printing or from other sources. 

On the loth of April, 1841, the Tribune appeared — a paper one- 
third the size of the present Tribune, price one cent ; office No. 
30 Ann street ; Horace Greeley, editor and proprietor, assisted in 
the department of literary criticism, the fine arts, and general 
intelligence, by H. J. Raymond. Under its heading, the new 
paper bore, as a m.otto, the dying words of Harrison : " I desire 

YOU TO understand THE TRUE PRINCIPLES OF GOVERNMENT. I 
V.'ISH THEM CARRIED OUT. I ASK NOTHING MORE." 

The Tribune began v.-ith about six hundred subscribers, pro- 
cured by the exertions of a few of the editor's personal and polit- 
ical friends. Five thousand copies of the first number were 
printed, and " we found some difficulty in giving them away," says 
Mr. Greeley in the article just quoted. The expenses of the first 
v.eek were five hundred and twenty-five dollars ; the receipts, 
ninety-two dollars. A sorry prospect for an editor whose whole 
cash capital was less than a thousand dollars, but the circulation 
steadily increased, the paper was enlarged in size, and it was a 
straight-forward, honest expression of the sentiments of Mr. Gree- 
ley, hurled fearlessly at abuse of every kind, and especially at 
corruption in the government. It soon became the favorite polit- 
ical organ of the east, a position steadily held to this day. 

The day which secured the nomination of General Taylor elected 
Horace Greeley to a seat in the House of Representatives, which 
the death of a member had made vacant. He was elected for one 
session only, and that, the short one of three months. How he 
came to be nominated has been explained by himself in a para- 
graph on the corruptive machinery of our primary elections : "An 
editor of the Tribune was once nominated through that machin- 
ery. So he was — to serve ninety days in Congress — and he does'nt 
feel a bit proud of it. But let it be considered that the conven- 
tion was not chosen to nominate him, and did not (we presume) 
think of doing any such thing, until it had unanimously nomi- 
nated another, who unexpectedly declined, and then one of us 
was pitched upon to supply his place. We don't know whether 
the primaries were as corrupt then as now or not; our impression 
is that they have been growing steadily worse and worse — but no 
matter — let us have them reformed." 

His nomination introduced great spirit into the contest, and he 
vv-as voted for with enthusiasm, particularly by two classes, work- 



36 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

ing-men and thinking-men. His majority over his opponent was 
3177, the whole number of votes being 5985. His majority con- 
siderably exceeded that of General Taylor in the same wards. At 
the close of his term Mr, Greeley returned to New York. He 
took leave of his constituents in a long letter published in the Tri- 
bune, in which he reviewed the proceedings of the late session, 
characterized it as a failure, and declined to take to himself any 
part of the blame thereof. These were his concluding words : 

" My work as your servant is done — whether well or ill it remains 
for you to judge. Very likely I gave the wrong vote on some of 
the difficult and complicated questions to which I was called to 
respond Aye or No with hardly a moment's warning. If so, you 
can detect and condemn the error; for my name stands recorded 
in the divisions by Yeas and Nays on every public and all but one 
private bill, (which was laid on the table the moment the sitting 
opened, and on which my name had just been passed as I entered 
the Hall). I wish it were the usage among us to publish less of 
speeches and more of propositions and votes thereupon — it would 
give the mass of the people a much clearer insight into the man- 
agement of their public affairs. My successor being already 
chosen and commissioned, I shall hardly be suspected of seeking 
your further kindness, and I shall be heartily rejoiced if he shall 
be able to combine equal zeal in your service with greater effi- 
ciency — equal fearlessness with greater popularity That I have 
been somewhat annoyed at times by some of the consequences of 
my mileage expose is true, but I have never wished to recall it, 
nor have I felt that I owed an apology to any, and I am quite con- 
fident, that if you had sent to AVashington (as you doubtless might 
have done) a more sternly honest and fearless Representative, he 
Avould have made himself more unpopular with a large portion of 
the House than I did. 

" I thank you heartily for the glimpse of public life which your 
favor has afforded me, and hope to render it useful henceforth, not 
to myself only but to the public. In ceasing to be your agent, 
and returning with renewed zest to my private cares and duties, I 
have a single additional favor to ask, not of you especially, but of 
all ; and I am sure my friends at least will grant it without hesita- 
tion. It is that you and they will oblige me henceforth by remem- 
bering that my name is simply. 

" Ht)RACF. Greeley." 

And thus ended Horace Greeley's three months in Congress. 
No man ever served his country more faithfully. No man ever 
received less reward. One would have supi)osed, that such a 
manly and brave endeavor to economize the public money and the 
public time, such singular devotion to the i)ublic interests in the 
face of opi)osition, oblotpiy, insult, would have elicited from the 
whole country, or at least from many parts of it, cordial expressions 



LIFE OK HORACE GREELEV. 37 

of approval. It did not, however. With no applauding shouts 
was Horace Greeley welcomed on his return from the seat of cor- 
ruption. No enthusiastic mass-meetings of his constituents passed 
a series of resolutions approving his course. He has not been 
named for re-election. Do the people, then, generally feel that an 
honest man is out of place in the Congress of the United States.' 

Only from the little town of North Fairlield, Ohio, came a hearty 
cry of Well Done! A meeting of the citizens of that place was 
held for the purpose of expressing their sense of his gallant and 
honorable conduct. He responded to their applauding resolu- 
tions in a characteristic letter. " Let me beg of you," said he, 
"to think little oi persons., in this connection, and much of mcas- 
7/rcs. Should any see fit to tell you that I am dishonest, or ambi- 
tious, or hollow-hearted in this matter, don't stop to contradict or 
confute him, but press on his attention the main question respect- 
ing the honesty of these crooked charges. It is with these the 
public is concerned, and not this or that man's motives. " As he 
lost his interest in party politics, his mind reverted to the soil. 
He yearned for the repose and the calm delights of country life. 

" As for me," he said, at the conclusion of an address before the 
Indiana State Agricultural Society, delivered in October, 1S53, 
" as for me, long tossed on the stormiest waves of doubtful con- 
flict and arduous endeavor, I have begun to feel, since the shades 
of forty years fell upon me, the weary, tempest-driven voyager's 
longing for land, the wanderer's yearning for the hamlet where in 
childhood he nestled by his mother's knee, and was soothed to 
sleep on her breast. The sober down-hill of life disoels many illu- 
sions, while it develops or strengthens within us the attachment, 
perhaps long smothered or overlaid, for " that dear hut, our home." 
And so I, in the sober afternoon of life, when its sun, if not high, 
is still warm, have bought a few acres of land in the broad, still 
country, and, bearing thither my household treasures, have resolved 
to steal from the city's labors and anxieties at least one day in each 
week, wherein to revive as a farmer the memories of my child- 
hood's early home. And already I realize that the experiment 
cannot cost so much as it is worth. Already I find in that day's 
quiet an antidote and a solace for the feverish, festering cares of 
the weeks which environ it. Already my brook murmurs a sooth- 
ing even-song to my burning, throbbing brain ; and my trees, 
gently stirred by the fresh breezes, whisper to my spirit something 
of their own quiet strength and patient trust in God. And thus 
do 1 faintly realize, though but for a brief and flitting clay, the serene 
joy which shall irradiate the Farmer's vocation, when a fuller and 
truer education shall have refined and chastened his animal crav- 
ings, and when science shall have endowed him with her treasures, 
redeeming labor from drudgery while quadrupling its efficiency, 
and crowning with beauty and plenty our bounteous, beneficent 
earth." 



^8^ LITE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

The portion of the " broad, still country " alluded to in this 
eloquent passage, is a farm of fifty acres in Westchester county, 
near Newcastle, close to the Harlem railroad, thirty-four miles 
from the city of New York. Thither the tired editor repairs every 
Saturday morning by an early train, and there he remains, direct- 
ing and assisting in the labors of the farm for that single day only, 
returning early enough on Sunday to hear the flowing rhetoric of 
Mr. Chapin's morning sermon. From church — to the office and 
to work. 

In the year 1855, w^hich was that of the first Paris Exhibition, 
Mr. Greeley again enjoyed a few weeks' holiday in Europe. The 
voyage, however, was anything but enjoyment. " I have ex- 
pressed," he says, " my own opinion of the sea and its behavior 
before, and do not care to reiterate it. I suffered far less intensely 
this time, and gratefully acknowledge the kind Providence which 
preserved us from the perils and afflictions by which others have 
been visited. But to me "a life on the ocean wave " is still sur- 
charged with misery, and a steamship on rocking billows the most 
intolerable prison wherewith man's follies or sins are visited. I 
think I could just endure the compound stench of grease and 
steam which " ascendeth for ever and ever " on board these fire- 
ships; I might even bear the addition to my agonies which the 
damp, chilly breeze (when it happens not to be a gale) never fails 
to induce; I might come in time to grapple with and throttle the 
demon Sea-sickness, remorseless as he is ; but when to these are 
added the fumes arising from the incessant cookery required for 
three or four hundred human beings, all huddled within a space 
two hundred feet long by some twenty-five wide, I am compelled 
to surrender. There certainly can be fabricated nowhere else on 
earth a jumble of smells so intolerably nauseous and sickening. 

While he was engaged in visiting the interesting objects of the 
French metropolis, he had the novel experience of being arrested 
for debt, and a debt which he had never contracted. Mr. Greeley 
has related this adventure at length, and in his own w^ay. The 
following is his narrative : 

THE ARREST. 

" I had been looking ai things if not info them for a good many 
years prior to yesterday. I had climbed mountains and descended 
into mines, had groped in caves and scaled precipices, seen Venice 
and Cincinnati, Dublin and Mineral Point, Niagara and St. 
Gothard, and really supposed I w\as approximating a middling 
outside knowledge of things in general. I had been chosen de- 
fendant in several libel suits, and been flattered with the inform- 
ation that my censures were deemed of more consequence than 
those of other people, and should be paid for accordingly. I had 
been through twenty of our States, yet never in a jail outside of 
New York, and over half Europe, yet never looked into one. 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 39 

Here I had been seeing Paris for the last six weeks, visiting this 
sight, then that, till there seemed little remaining worth looking 
at or after, yet I had never once thought of looking into a debt- 
ors' prison. I should have probably gone away next week, as 
ignorant in that regard as I came, when circumstances favored 
me most unexpectedly with an inside view of this famous ' Maison 
de Detention,' or Prison for Debtors, 70 Rue de Clichy. 1 think 
what I have seen here, fairly told, must be instructive and inter- 
esting, and I suppose others will tell the story if I do not, and I 
don't know any one whose opportunities will enable him to tell it 
so accurately as I can. So here goes: 

" 1 had been down at the Palace of Industry and returned to 
my lodgings, when, a little before four o'clock yesterday afternoon, 
four strangers called for me. By the help of my courier, I soon 
learned that they had a writ of arrest for me at the suit of one 
Mons, Lechesne, sculptor, affirming that he sent a statue to 
the New York Crystal Palace Exhibition, at or on the way to 
which it had been broken, so that it could not be (at all events it 
had not been) restored to him ; wherefore he asked of me, as a 
director and representative of the Crystal Palace Association, to 
pay him 'douze mille frances,' or ^2,500. Not happening to have 
the change, and no idea of paying this demand if I had it, I could 
only signify those facts ; whereupon they told me that I was under 
arrest, and must go along, which I readily did. We drove cir- 
cuitously to the sculptor's residence at the other end of Paris, 
Avaited his convenience for a long half-hour, and then went to the 
President Judge who had issued the writ. I briefly explained to him 
my side of the case, when he asked me if I wished to give bail. 
I told him I would give good bail for my appearance at court at 
any time, but that I knew no man in Paris whom I felt willing to 
ask to become my security for the payment of so large a sum as 
§2,500. After a little parley I named Judge Piatt, United States 
Secretary of Legation, as one who, I felt confident, would recog- 
nize for my appearance when wanted, and this -uggestion met with 
universal assent. Twice over I carefully explainecl that I preferred 
going to prison to asking any friend to give bail for the payment 
in any case of this claim, and knew I Avas fully understood. So 
we all, except the judge, drove off to the Legation. 

" There we found Judge P., who readily agreed to recognize as 
I required ; but now the plaintiff and his lawyer refused to accept 
him as security in any way, alleging that he was privileged from 
arrest by his office. He offered to give his check on Greene & 
Co., bankers, for the 12,000 francs in dispute as security for my 
ap})earance; but they would not have him in any shape. While 
we were chaffering, Mr. Maunsell B. Field, United States Com- 
missioner in the French Exposition, came along, and offered to 
ioin Mr. Piatt in the recognizance ; but nothing would do. Mr. 
Field then offered to raise the money demanded ; but I said, No, 



40 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

if the agreement before the judge was not adhered to by the other 
side, I would give no bail whatever, but go to prison. High words 
ensued, and the beginning of a scuffle, in the midst of which I, 
half unconciously, descended from the carriage. Of course I was 
ordered back instanlcr, and obeyed so soon as I understood the 
order, but we were all, by this time losing temper. As putting 
me in jail would simply secure my forthcoming when wanted, and 
as I was ready to give any amount of security for this, which the 
other side had once agreed to take, I thought they were rather 
crowding matters in the course they were taking. So, as I was 
making my friends too late for a pleasant dinner-party at Trois 
Frcrcs^ where I had expected to join them, I closed the discussion 
by insisting that we should drive oft". 

" Crossing the Avenue Champs Elysees the next moment, our 
horses struck another horse, took fright, and ran until reined up 
against a tree, disabling the concern. My cortege of officers got 
out; I attempted to follow, but was thrust back very roughly and 
held in with superfluous energy, since they had had abundant op- 
portunity to see that I had no idea of getting away from them. I 
had in fact evinced ample determination to enjoy their delightful 
society to the utmost. At last they had to transfer me to another 
carriage, but they made such a parade of it, and insisted on taking 
hold of me so numerously and so fussily (this being just the most 
thronged and conspicuous locality in Paris), that I came near 
losing my temper again. We got along, however, and in due time 
arrived at this spacious, substantial, secure establishment. No. 70 
Rue de Clichy. 

" I was brought in through three or four heavy iron doors to the 
office of the Governor, where I was properly received. Here I 
was told I must stay till nine o'clock, since the President Judge 
had allowed me till that hour to find bail. In vain I urged that I 
had refused to give bail, would give none, and wanted to be shown 
to my cell ; I must stay here till nine o'clock. So I ordered 
something for dinner and amused myself by looking at the ball 
play, &c., of the prisoners in the yard, to whose immunities I was 
not yet eligible, but I had the privilege of looking in through the 
barred windows. The yard is one of the best I have ever seen 
anywhere, has a good many trees and some flowers, and, as the 
wall is at least fiteen feet high, and another of twenty surrounding 
it, with guards with loaded muskets always pacing between,! 
should judge the danger of burglary or other annoyances from 
without very moderate. 

" My first visitor was Judge Mason, U. S. Embassador, accom- 
panied by Mr. Kirby, one of the attaches of the P^mbassy. Judge 
M. had heard of my luck from the Legation, and was willing to 
serve me to any extent, and in any manner. 1 was reminded by 
my position of the case of the prying Yankee who undertook to 
fish out a gratuitous opinion on a knotty point in a lawsuit in. 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 4I 

which he was involved. ' Supposing,' said he to an eminent coun- 
selor, * you were involved in such and such a difficulty, what would 
you do ?' ' Sir,' said the counselor, with becoming gravity,' I should 
take the very best legal advice I could obtain.' I told Judge M. that 
I wanted neither money nor bail, but a first-rate French lawyer, 
who could understand my statements in English, at the very 
earliest moment. Judge M. left to call on Mr. James Munroe, 
banker, and send me a lawyer as soon as could be. This was 
done, but it was eight o'clock on Saturday night, before which 
hour at this season most eminent Parisians have left for their 
country residences ; and no lawyer of the proi)er stamp and stand- 
ing could then be or has yet been found. 

" Things have worked to-day very much as I had hoped and 
calculated. Friends had been in active quest of such law- 
yers as I needed, and two of the right sort were with me at a sea- 
sonable hour in the morning. At three o'clock they had a hearing 
before the Judge, and we were all ready for it, thanks to friends 
inside of the gratings as well as out. Judge Piatt's official certificate 
as to the laws of our State governing the liability of corporators 
has been of vital service to me ; and when my lawyers asked, 
' Where is your evidence that the effects of the New York Asso- 
ciation are now in the hands of a receiver?' I answered, 'The 
gentleman who was talking with me in the visitors' room when 
you came in and took me away knows that ])erfectly; perhaps he 
is there yet.' I was at once sent for Iiim, and found him there. 
Thus all things cons^jired for good ; antl at four o'clock my 
lawyers and friends came to Clichy to bid me walk out, without 
troubling my friends for any security or deposit whatever. So I 
guess my last chance of ever learning French is gone by the 
board." 

An interesting event in the life of Horace Greeley, and in the 
history of the country occurred in May, 1S67, when he went to 
Richmond for the purpose of signing the bail-bond which restored 
to liberty Jefferson Davis, after two years' confinement in Fort- 
ress Monroe. " I went to Richmond," he says, " and signed the 
bond, simply because the leading counsel for the prisoner deemed 
it important. If any other name would have answered as well, 
they would not have proffered mine ; for they could easily have 
given ten millions of dollars, all of it l)y men who were wortli 
■double the amount for which they became responsible, and each 
of whom would have esteemed signing the bond a privilege. Put 
the counsel believed it eminently desirable that they should pre- 
sent some northern names, of men who had been conspicuous op- 
ponents of the rebellion ; perhaps because the application to admit to 
bail would be otherwise strenuously resisted. I know nothing of 
their reasons; 1 only know that they would not have required me 
to face this deluge of mud if they had not believed it necessary." 

The bond was for the sum of one hundred thousand dollars, 



42 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

and ^vas signed by twenty persons, among whom were Horace 
Greeley, John Minor Eotts, Augustus Schell, Cierritt Smith and 
Cornelius Vanderbilt. " A happier looking man," wrote one of 
the reporters, " never pledged himself for another's honor than 
Horace Greeley appeared, as he took the pen and affixed himself 
as surety upon the bond. He had scarcely laid down the pen 
and turned from the clerk's table, when Mr. Davis hastily put him- 
self in his way, and grasping his hand, uttered a few warm words 
of acknowledgment. It was their first meeting, and he returned 
the pressure and ventured to hope, in a few homely sentences, that 
he had done his companion an essential service. 

" The announcement of Judge Underwood : ' The United States 
marshal' will now discharge the prisoner from custody,' was the 
signal for giving vent to the delight that had been so imperfectly 
schooled among the audience during the early progress of the pro- 
ceedings. For a moment the din was terrific, and "would not 
be subdued by any amount of crying the peace by the marshal. 

" Mr. Davis was seized, congratulated, and sobbed over, ^md in 
the same moment hurried from the court room to the street, where 
a thousand people were uncovered and cheering as he passed. 
Alighted from his carriage at the hotel, the crowd demanded audi- 
ence, and for two hours thereafter poured into his parlors, so tear- 
ful and hapi^y, that it was impossible not to catch the infection. 
Later, Mr. Davis drove out with his friends, everywhere encoun- 
tering cheers and congratulations from the people surrounding his 
carriage-wheels to those upon the house-tops." 

If we may judge from the southern newspapers, this act of the 
editor of the Tribune will do its part toward the reconciliation of 
the country. The Richmond Whig said : 

" The generous course pursued toward Mr. Davis yesterday was 
one of the most effective reconstruction steps yet taken. It was. 
indeed a stride in that direction. But the legal action taken was 
not all that we feel called upon to notice. That action was ac- 
companied and embellished by circumstances of courtesy and 
cordial generosity from northern and republican gentlemen or 
distinction and influence, which will go far to commend them to 
the grateful consideration of the South. They joined our own 
Virginians in both bail-bonds and congratulations. In so doing 
they illustrated their magnanimity, and in one moment leveled 
barriers that might otherwise have remained for years. The effect 
of yesterday's work will be felt and shown throughout the South,. 
or we much mistake southern character. Let us all show that 
northern generosity is the true avenue to southern friendship We 
repeat, a great stride w^as yesterday taken in the line of recon- 
struction." 

The Lynchburg Virginian held the following language : 

" We hail the event as an auspicious one, fraught with good, and 
recognize the present as a fortunate time for both sections of the 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 43 

Union to set out with ca new purpose, to Iniry their animosities, and 
meet together on a common ground of justice, peace and frater- 
nity. No one, we are sure, would do more to bring about such a 
result, or more rejoice at it, than he who was yesterday restored to 
the free air of heaven from the confines of his long incarceration." 

In the summer of 1859 Mr. Greeley made his celebrated journey 
across the Plains to California, the i)articulars of which, accord- 
ing to his custom, he related to his readers. The manner in 
which he announced his purpose was characteristic : " About the 
first of October next we are to have a State election ; then a city 
contest ; then the organization and long session of a new Con- 
gress ; then a Presidential struggle ; then Congress again ; which 
brings us to the forming of a new national administration and 
the summer of 1861. If, therefore, I am to have any res])ite from 
editorial labor for the next two years I must take it now." So 
on the 9th of May, 1S59, he left New York for a trip across the 
continent. 

When he visited Pike's Peak he had been posted upon the 
questionable practices sometimes resorted to by miners to secure 
a big " prospect," and establish a fictitious value to property, and 
he determined to accept no man's word about the richness or 
abundance of gold deposits in the Gregory mines. No "salting" 
process should lead him into any mistaken or unauthorized report 
to the one hundred thousand readers of the Tribune ! So he 
insisted that he should be permitted to select and dig from the 
hard-packed earth in one of the mines, a panful of dirt, and wash 
it out himself. He was careful to examine the condition of the 
hole selected for his experiment, satisfying himself that no pick 
or shovel blade had ever disturbed the spot, and that if the " pan- 
ning" process revealed the existence of gold, the " prospect" could 
be taken as bona fide evidence of the condition of the mine. Mr. 
Greeley carried out his programme to the letter — picking, shovel- 
ing and panning out with his own hands. As the dirt gradually 
disappeared under the influence of water and the gyratory motions 
of the philosopher, the " color " of the glistening ore began to 
disclose itself, and when the process was completed, over an 
ounce of fine gold scales and dust were revealed to sight. The 
amateur "panner" could not conceal his astonishment and grati- 
fication over this result ; but when the miner from whose claim 
he had taken the dirt carelessly asked him to accept the gold, and 
intimated that " the product of this pan was a little below the 
average," he was speechless with amazement, and became at once 
a " mining convert." How this rich prospect happened to get into 
]Mr. Greeley's pan of dirt, is not positively known ; but the follow- 
ing theory has been generally accepted : Several ounces of 
fine gold discharged from double-barreled guns into the bottom 
of the hole, had been scattered over the entire surface, forming a. 
very rich " deposit," without disturbing, visibly, the natural com- 



44 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

pactncss of the solid earth. Such overwhelming proof of the 
productiveness of the mines of the Pike's Peak region, could not 
be gainsaycd or contradicted ; and soon thereafter the columns of 
the Tribune contained glowing accounts of Mr. (ireeley's personal 
•observations and experience in the Gregory district. 

Having seen the buffaloes, Mr. Greeley had a strong desire to 
see the elephant, and accordingly, upon his arrival at Salt Lake 
City, proceeded to call with a friend upon Brigham Young. We 
prefer him to give his interview in his own inimitable style. 

"We were very cordially welcomed at the door by the President, 
who led us into the second-story parlor of the largest of his houses 
(he has three), where I was introduced to Heber C. Kimball, Gen- 
eral Wells, General Ferguson, Albert Carrington, Elias Smith, 
and several other leading men in the Church, with two full-grown 
sons of the President. After some unimportant conversation on' 
general topics, I stated that I had come in quest of fuller knowl- 
edge respecting the doctrines and ])olity of the Mormon Church, 
and would like to ask some questions bearing directly on these, 
if there were no objection. President Young avowing his willing- 
ness to res])ond to all pertinent inquiries, the conversation pro- 
ceeded substantially as follows : 

*' H. G. Am I to regard Mormonism (so-called) as a new reli- 
gion, or as simply a new development of Christianity .'' 

^ B. V. We hold that there can be no true Christian Church 
without a priesthood directly commissioned by and in imme- 
diate communication with the Son of God and Savior of man- 
kind. Such a church is that of the Latter-Day Saints, called by 
their enemies Mormons ; we know no other that even pretends to 
have present and direct revelations of God's will. 

" JI. G. Then I am to understand that you regard all other 
churches professing to be Christian as the Church of Rome re- 
gards all churches not in communion with itself, — as schismatic, 
heretical, and out of the way of salvation ? 

" I>. V. Yes, substantially. 

"If. G. Apart from this, in what respect do your doctrines 
.differ essentially from those of our orthodox Protestant Churches, 
— the Baptist or Methodist, for example ? 

" B. Y. We hold the doctrines of Christianity as revealed in 
the Old and New Testaments, also in the Book of Mormon, which 
teaches the same cardinal truths, and those only. 

" H. G. Do you believe in the doctrine of the Trinity } 

"/*". Y. We do ; but not exactly as it is held by other churches. 
We believe in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, as 
equal, but not identical, — not as one person [being]. We believe 
in all the Bible teaches on this subject. 

"//. G. Do you believe in a personal Devil, a distinct, conscious, 
spiritual being, whose nature and acts are essentially malignant 
and evil .'' 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 45 

" B. Y. We do. 

" H. G. Do you hold the doctrine of eternal punishment ? 

"-5. )'. We do; though perhaps not exactly as other churches 
do. We believe it as the Bible teaches it. 

" //. G. I understand that you regard baptism by immersion as 
essential. 

'' B. Y. We do. 

" H. G. Do you practice infant baptism ? 

'' B. Y. No. 

*' H. G. Do you make removal to these valleys obligatory on 
your converts } 

" B. Y. They would consider themselves greatly aggrieved if 
they were not invited hither. We hold to such a gathering to- 
gether of (rod's people as the Bible foretells, and that this is the 
place, and now is the time appointed for its consummation. 

"//. G. The predictions to which you refer have usually, I 
think, been understood to indicate Jerusalem (or Judxa) as the 
place of such gathering. 

"7?. Y. Yes; for the Jews; not for others. 

" //. G. What is the position of your church with respect to 
slavery ? 

" B. Y. We consider it of Divine institution, and not to be abol- 
ished until the curse pronounced on Ham shall have been removed 
from his descendants. 

" //. G. Are any slaves now held in this Territory.' 

" B. Y. There are. 

"7/. G. Do your Territorial laws uphold slavery.' 

" B. Y. Those laws are printed, you can read for yourself. 
If slaves are brought here by those who owned them in the 
States, we do not favor their escape from the service of those 
owners. 

"//. G. Am I to infer that Utah, if admitted as a member of the 
Federal Union, will be a slave State .■' 

" /)'. Y. No ; she will be a free State. Slavery here would prove 
useless and unprofitable. I regard it generally as a curse to the 
masters. I myself hire many laborers, and pay them fair wages ; 
I could not afford to own them. I can do better than subject my- 
self to an obligation to feed and clothe their families, to provide 
and care for them in sickness and health. Utah is not adapted to 
slave labor. 

" //. G. Let me now be enlightened with regard more especially 
to your Church polity. 1 understand that you recjuire each 
member to pay over one tenth of all he produces or earns to the 
Church, 

" B. Y. That is a requirement of our faith. There is no com- 
pulsion as to the payment. Each member acts in the premises 
according to his pleasure, under the dictates of his own con- 
science. 



46 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

'''' H. G. What is done with the proceeds of this tithing ? 

" B. Y. Part of it is devoted to building temples and other places 
of worship; i)art to hel])ing the poor and needy converts on their 
way to this country; and the largest portion to the support of the 
poor among the Saints. 

" H. G. Is none of it paid to bishops and other dignitaries of 
the Church.^ 

"-Z?. Y. Not one penny. No bishop, no elder, no deacon, or 
■other church officer, receives any compensation for his official ser- 
vices. A bishop is often recpiired to put his hand in his own 
pocket and provide therefrom for the poor of his charge ; but he 
never receives anything for his services. 

"//. G. How, then, do your ministers live ' 

" B. Y. By the labor of their own hands, like the first Apostles. 
Every bishop, every elder, may be daily seen at work in the field 
or the shop, like his neighbors ; every minister of the Church has 
his proper calling by which he earns the bread of his family; he 
-who cannot or will not do the Church work for nothing is not 
■wanted in her service; even her lawyers (pointing to General Fer- 
guson and another present, who are the regular lawyers of the 
Church) are paid nothing for their services; I am the only person 
, in the Church who has not a regular calling apart from the Church's 
service, and I never received one farthing from her treasury ; if I 
obtain anything from the tithing-house, I am charged with and 
pay for it, just as any one else would; the clerks in the tithing- 
store are paid like other clerks, but no one is ever paid for any 
service pertaining to the ministry. We think a man who cannot 
make his living aside from the ministry of Christ unsuited to that 
office. I am called rich, and consider myself worth $250,000 ; but 
no dollar of it was ever paid me by the Church, or for any service 
as a minister of the everlasting Gospel. I lost nearly all I had 
when we were broken up in Missouri and driven from that State. 
I was nearly stripped again when Joseph Smith was murdered 
and we were driven from Illinois; but nothing was ever made up 
to me by the Church, nor by any one. I believe I know how to 
acquire property, and how to take care of it. 

" J:f. G. Can you give me any rational explanation of the aver- 
sion and hatred with which your people are generally regarded 
by those among whom they have lived and with whom they have 
been brought directly in contact ? 

" B. Y. No other explanation than is afforded by the crucifixion 
of Christ and the kindred treatment of God's ministers, prophets, 
and saints in all ages. 

" BI. G. I know that a new sect is always decried and traduced ; 
that it is hardly ever deemed respectable to belong to one ; that 
the Baptists, Quakers, Methodists, Universalists, etc., have each 
in their turn been regarded in the infancy of their sect as the off- 
scouring of the earth ; yet I cannot remember that either of them 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 47 

were ever generally represented and regarded by the older sects 
of their early days as thieves, robbers, murderers. 

" B. Y. If you \vill consult the contemporary Jewish accounts 
of the life and acts of Jesus Christ, you will find that he and his 
disciples were accused of every abominable deed and i^urpose — 
robbery and murder included. Such a work is still extant, and 
may be found by those who seek it. 

"jy. G. What do you say of the so-called Danites or Destroy- 
ing Angels, belonging to your Church ? 

'' ^5". ]'. What doj^wsay? I know of no such band, no such 
persons or organization. I hear of them only in the slanders of 
our enemies. 

" //. G. With regard, then, to the grave question on which your 
doctrines and practices are avowedly at war with those of the 
Christian world — that of a plurality of wives — is the system of 
your Church acceptable to the majority of its women } 

" B. V. They could not be more averse to it than I was when 
it was first revealed to us as the Divine will. I think they gen- 
erally accept it, as I do, as the will of God. 

'' //. G. How general is polygamy among you ? 

" B. Y. I could not say. Some of those present [heads of the 
Church] have each but one wife ; others have more ; each deter- 
mines what is his individual duty. 

" //. G. What is the largest num.ber of wives belonging to any 



one man 



" B. Y. 1 have fii'teen ; I know no one who has more ; but some 
of those sealed to me are old ladies whom I regard rather as 
mothers than wives, but whom I have taken home to cherish and 
support. 

'' U. G. Does not the A]:iostle Paul say that a bishop should be 
' the husband of one wife ?' 

■' B. Y. So we hold. We do not regard any but a married man 
as fitted for the ofiice of bishop. But the apostle does not forbid 
a bishop having more wives than one. 

" //. G. Does not Christ say that he avIio puts away his wife, or 
marries one whom another has put away, commits adultery .'' 

" B. Y. Yes ; and I hold that no man should ever put away a 
wife except for adultery — not always even for that. Such is -my 
individual view of the matter. I do not say that wives have never 
been put away in our Church, but that I do not approve of the 
])ractice. 

" //. G. How do you regard what is commonly termed the 
Christian Sabbath .'' 

" y/. Y. As a divinely api)ointed day of rest. AV'e enjoin all to 
rest from secular labor on that day. We would have no man 
enslaved to the Sabbath, but we enjoin all to respect and en- 
joy it." 



48 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

HIS oriMOx of polvgamv. 

" I have enjoyed opportunities for visiting Mormons, and study- 
ing IMormonism in the homes of its votaries, and of discussing 
with them what the outside world regards as its distinguishing 
feature, in the freedom of friendly social intercourse. In one in- 
stance, a veteran apostle of the faith, having first introduced to 
me a worthy matron of fifty-five or sixty — the wife of his youth 
and the mother of his grown-up sons — as Mrs. T., soon after in- 
troduced a young and winning lady of perha]xs twenty-five sum- 
mers, in these words: * Here is another Mrs. T.' This lady is a 
recent emigrant from our State, of more than average powers of 
mind and graces of ]K'rson, who came here with her brother as a 
convert, a little over a year ago, and has been the sixth wife 
of Mr. T. since a few weeks after her arrival. (The intermediate 
four wives of Elder T. live on a farm or farms some miles distant.) 
The manner of the husband was perfectly unconstrained and off- 
hand throughout; but I could not well be mistaken in my convic-- 
tion that both ladies failed to conceal dissatisfaction with their 
position in the eyes of their visitor and of the world. They 
seemed to feel that it needed vindication. Their manner toward 
.each other was most cordial and sisterly — sincerely so, I doubt 
not — but this is by no means the rule. A Gentile friend, whose 
duties recjuire him to travel widely over the territory, in- 
forms me that he has repeatedly stopped witli a bisho]i, some 
hundred miles south of this, whose two wives he has never known 
to address each other, or evince the slightest cordiality, during 
the hours he has spent in their society. 

The bishop's house consists of two rooms; and when my in- 
formant stayed there with a Gentile friend, the bishop being absent, 
one wife slept in the same apartment with them, rather than in that 
occupied by her double. I presume that an extreme case, but 
the spirit which impels it is not unusual. I met this evening a 
large party of young ])eople, consisting in nearly equal numbers of 
husbands and wives; but no husband was attended by more than 
one wife, and no gentleman admitted or imjjlied, in our repeated 
and animated discussions of polygamy, that //r had more than one 
wife. And I was again struck by the circumstance that here, as 
heretofore, no woman indicated by word or look her approval of 
any argument in favor of i)olygamy. That many women acipiiesce 
in it as an ordinance of (iod, and have been drilled into a me- 
chanical assent to the logic by which it is upheld, I believe ; but 
that there is not a Avoman in Utah who does not in her heart wish 
that God had not ordained it I am confident. And quite a num- 
ber of the young men treat it in conversation as a temporaiy 
or experimental arrangement, which is to be sustained or put 
aside as experience shall demonstrate its utility or mischief. 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 49 

"One old Mormon farmer, with whom I discussed the matter pri- 
vately, admitted that it was impossible for a poor working man to 
have a well-ordered, well-governed household, where his children 
had two or more living mothers occupying the same ordinary 
dwelling. On the whole, I conclude that polygamy, as it was a 
graft on the original stock of Mormonism, will be outlived by the 
root ; that there will be a new revelation ere many years, whereby 
the saints will be admonished to love and cherish the wives they 
already have, but not to marry any more beyond the natuial 
assignment of one wife to each husband. 

" I regret that I have found time and opportunity to visit but 
one of the nineteen common schools of this city. This was thinly 
attended by children nearly all quite young, and of the most rudi- 
mentary attainments. Their phrenological developments were, in 
the average, bad ; I say this with freedom, since I have stated that 
those of the adults, as I noted them in the Tabernacle, were good. 
But I am told that idiotic or malformed children are very rare, if 
not unknown here. The male Saints emphasize the fact that a 
majority of the children born here are girls, holding it a proof 
that Providence smiles on their 'peculiar institution'; I, on the 
contrary, maintain that such is the case in all polygamous coun- 
tries, and prove simply a preponderance of vigor on the part of the 
mothers over that of the fathers wherever this result is noted. I 
presume that a majority of the children of old husbands by young 
wives in any community are girls." 

MR. GREELEY EXCITES CONSTERNATION. 

While the editor of the Tribune was pursuing his journey 
across the continent, a California paper published a burlesque 
paragraph to the effect that he " was on his way to California to 
take command of all the fillibusters to be found there; that Hen- 
ningsen and Walker would join him with forces collected in the 
Atlantic States ; and that the whole horde, under the supreme 
command of Horace Greeley, would invade Mexico and usurp the 
government of the Republic." A copy of this paper fell into the 
hands of the commander at Mazatlan, and he at once issued a 
proclamation informing the people that one " Horace Greeley, a 
most diabolical, bloodthirsty, and unmerciful man, worse than the 
infamous Walker, or even the minions of Miramon ; a man whose 
very name struck dread to the hearts of thousands in the United 
States, so many were his crimes and so terrible was his conduct ; 
is now at the head of the most extensive band of fillibusters ever 
collected, and on his way to Mexico !" He then exhorts the peo- 
ple to prepare themselves for instant action, and concludes thus : 
" This dangerous man is not of the common school of fillibusters : 
they wish for plunder, he for blood and murderous deeds." 

Mr. Greeley grew old apace. He had not been more fortunate 
than less favored mortals — had neither quaffed from, nor found the 



50 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

fountain of perpetual youth, and a longing to taste again the quiet 
delights of his boyhood — to live in, to own a spot of ground, to 
rear him a home where the bustle and turmoil of the city should 
not reach, grew very strong upon him ; and he bought him a farm 
near enough to the city to admit of his passing to and fro each 
day when necessary, and his book, " What I know about Farm- 
ing," is the result of observations and experiments of his own, 
given to th(^ world. As an agriculturist, Mr. Greeley is a success ; 
indeed, we might say, with an irreverent visitor to Henry Ward 
Beecher's farm, " Alas, the pity — what a splendid farmer was spoiled 
■when that man took to preaching." 

Horace Greeley in this year, 1872, is sixty years of age. He 
stands five feet ten and a-half inches, and weighs, perhaps, one 
hundred and fifty-five pounds. He stoops a little, and in walking 
he swings from side to side, something in the manner of a plough- 
man. Seen from behind, he looks, as he walks with head de- 
pressed, bended back, and swaying gait, like an old man ; an 
illusion which is heightened, if a stray lock of white hair escapes 
from under his hat. But the expression of his face is singularly 
and engagingly youthful. His complexion is extremely fair, and 
a smile ])lays ever upon his countenance. His head, measured 
round the organs of Individuality and Philoprogenitiveness, is 
twenty-three and a half inches in circumference, which is consid- 
erably larger than the average. His forehead is round and full, 
and rises into a high and ample dome. The hair is white, inclin- 
ing to red at the ends, and thinly scattered over the head. Seated 
in company, with his hat off, he looks not unlike the " Philoso- 
pher " he is often called ; no one could take him for a common 
man. 

According to the Phrenological Journal, his brain is very large, 
in the right place, well balanced, and of the best form, long, nar- 
row and high. It indicates, says the same authority, small 
animality and selfishness, extreme benevolence, natural nobleness, 
and loftiness of aim. His controlling organs are Adhesiveness, 
Benevolence, Firmness and Conscientiousness. Reverence is 
small ; Destructiveness and Acquisitiveness less. Amativeness 
and Philoprogenitiveness are fully developed. The Love of Ap- 
probation is prominent ; Self-Esteem not so. Resistance and 
Moral Courage are very full ; Secretiveness full; Cautiousness 
large; Continuity small; deality fair, Taste ZYr_y small ; Im- 
itation small Mirthfulness very large ; Eventuality and Compar- 
ison large ; Language good; Reasoning better; Agreeableness 
deficient; Intuition great; Temperament active. His body, adds 
the Phrenologist, is not enough for his head. 

In manner, Horace Greeley is still a rustic. The metropolis 
has not been able to make much impression upon him. He lives 
amidst the million of his fellow-citizens, in their various uniforms, 
an unassimilated man. 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEV. 5 1 

I have seen Horace Greeley in Broadway on Sunday morning 
with a hole in his elbow and straws clinging to his hat. I have 
seen him asleep while Alboni was singing. When he is asked re- 
specting his health, he answers sometimes by the single word 
" stout," and here the subject drops. He is a man who might 
save a nation, but never learn to tie a cravat ; no, not if Brum- 
mell gave him a thousand lessons. 

Mr. (Ireeley has few intimate friends and no cronies. He gives 
no parties, attends few ; has no pleasures, so called ; and suffers 
little pain. In some respects, he is exceedingly frank ; in others, 
no man is more reserved. For example, his pecuniary affairs, 
around which most men throw an awful mystery, he has no scru- 
ples about revealing to any passing stranger, or even to the public ; 
and that in the fullest detail. But he can keep a secret with any 
man living, and he seldom talks about what interests him 
most. Margaret Fuller had a passion for looking at the naked 
souls of her friends ; and she often tried to get a peep into the 
inner bosom of Horace Greeley ; but he kept it buttoned close 
against her observation. Indeed, the kind of revelation in which 
she delighted he entirely detests, as probably every healthy mind 
does. 

He loves a joke, and tells a comic story with great glee. His 
cheerfulness is habitual, and probably he never knew two consec- 
utive hours of melancholy in his life. His manner is sometimes 
exceedingly ungracious ; he is not apt to suppress a yawn in the 
presence of a conceited bore; but if the bore is a bore innocently, 
he submits to the infliction with a surprising patience. He has a 
singular hatred of bungling, and rates a bungler sometimes wi^h 
extraordinary vehemence. 

He clings to an opinion, nowever, or a prejudice, with the 
tenacity of his race ; and has rarely been brought to own himself 
in the wrong. If he changes his opinion, which sometimes he 
does, he may show it by altered conduct, seldom by a confession 
in words. 

THE LAST INTERVIEW r!ETWEEX GREELEY AXD GRANT. 

The last interview between these two gentlemen occurred at 
the time of General "VValbridge's funeral, I believe in March, 1871. 
Walbridge was one of Greeley's favorites, and he had recom- 
mended him for the collectorship for the port. Some time before 
the death of Walbridge, a person in confidential relations with 
Grant told Greeley in New York that the president wanted to see 
him for the purpose of having a talk about New York politics. 
This was after the Syracuse convention, famous in New York 
politics, and at a time when the republican party needed most 
careful and judicious nursing to keep it from going to pieces. 
Greeley felt the condition of affairs very deeply, and while he did 
not conceal from the public his opinions that Grant and his friends 



52 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

had blundered, he yet was careful that his paper [should take 
a forbearing course. He did not openly censure Grant, but he 
mildly disapproved of some things which he had done. When 
Greeley therefore, received intimations that Grant would like to 
see him, he felt that the president had a keen sense of the danger 
that threatened, and would do his best to avert it, Walbridge's 
death occurred soon afterward, and Greeley and Murphy and 
other politicians from New York came on to attend the funeral. 

While at the grave, General Horace Porter went to Mr. Gree- 
ley and said that the president would be happy to have Mr. 
Greeley ride home in his (the president's) carriage. Mr. Greeley 
accepted the invitation, and the two were driven to the White 
House. On the president's invitation, Mr. Greeley entered the 
White House, and stayed to dinner. Greeley, all this time, was 
waiting for the New York politics that was to be the subject of 
conversation. It was not mentioned in the carriage, nor pre- 
vious to dinner, nor at dinner. After dinner Grant struck off on 
farming. He heard that Greeley took great interest in farming ; 
somebody had told him he had written a book on the subject, and 
he thought that would be an interesting topic to the philosopher. 
So Grant talked about his own farm near St. Louis, and of Gree- 
ley's near Chappaqua; he talked about his own fine mares, his 
blooded stock, and of Marshal Brown's pups. 

All these things were interesting to Greeley, but they would not 
prevent the republican party in New York from splitting to pieces. 
Greeley wanted to talk politics. It was manifestly not his place 
■as the guest of the president to force his opinions upon Grant, 
and he was with the president four mortal hours and New York 
matters were not alluded to. He went away more in sorrow than 
in anger — he was disappointed and discouraged. He went down 
to the Tribune's Washington office and there met Senator Henry 
Wilson, to whom he related the whole occurrence. Grant, on his 
part, felt very buoyant. He thought he had entertained Greeley 
very satisfactorily. 

MR. GREELEY AT HOME. 

The village of Chappaqua, the country home of Mr. Greeley, is 
thirty-two miles from the City Hall, on the Harlem Railroad. It 
is of the traditional railroad village order. It has a dozen or two 
houses of white frame, including the railway station, the post office, 
the tavern, the store, the church and the blacksmith shop. It is sur- 
rounded by high wooded hills, from the sides of which peep the 
white country houses of a few city gentlemen. It is full of lusty, 
sun-browned men, who go about all week days in their shirt sleeves, 
and of cherry-riy)e faced buxom lasses, who take heartily to bright- 
colored Dolly-Vardens. They are all sociable. Every man, 
woman, youth, lassie, and child in Chappaqua is anxious and 
willing to enlighten the stranger in their midst upon the subject of 



LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 53 

Mr. Greeley. There is no other subject which the liighly elated 
village cares to discuss just now. Even the "crops and weather " 
are insignificant in comparison. 

THE CHIEF OF CHAPPAQUA. 

Mr. Greeley is almost a lord of the manor. His house on the 
roadside is only a stone's throw from the Chappaqua Hotel and 
the railroad track. It sits on the side of the hill, slightly elevated 
over its neighbors in the village, and from its low-roofed porch or 
piazza the sage, when at home, can view the whole village over 
which, by reason of his great repute and his wide philanthrophy, 
he exercises a sort of kindly dominion, similar to that of a loving 
lord of the feudal ages. A broad dirt road leads you up the 
windings of a hill to his other house in the woods, whence he has 
even a more commanding view of his domain. 

CARING FOR AGED AND INFIRM SERVANTS. 

Beyond this is his stone barn, his cow pasture, wherein the old 
bovine that gave milk for his children, is suffered to chew her 
sweet cud in comfortable retirement, unvexed by the milkmaid 
and undoomed to slaughter, respected and revered by her master, 
pointed out to all comers eagerly by the rustic guides and " taken " 
with hearty appreciation by all the pictorial artists. The orchard, 
which is silvered all over with blossoming fruit, adjoins the pas- 
ture. The dark, swampy morass, which his masterly system of 
drainage has reclaimed to the uses of agriculture, lies at the bot- 
tom of the hill, rich in the blackness of its soil. 

THE GREAT WOODS 

wherein the physical forces of the philosopher rejuvenate them- 
selves after the intellectual exercises of the sanctum, crown the 
hill. They are not the great primeval forests of the earlier days. 
Only here and there a great oak rears its head grandly. The 
rest are trees that a great Western farmer would hardly take much 
pride in. But they are large enough to tax the physical powers of his 
friends who come to his farm to question the philosopher on po- 
litical subjects. He has a courteous way of setting the interlo- 
cutor to axing trees while he would fain be axing questions. 

THE FENCING. 

Stone fences, neat and regularly built, traverse the farm, shut- 
ting out the woods from the swamp, the pasture from the orchard, 
and the barnyard from the ploughed land. Wooden paling serve 
for the garden and house fencing. 

THE WATER SUPPLY. 

A dozen springs give out an inexhaustible supply of pure living 
water. They are carefully enclosed, and one far up in a little glen, 



54 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

the peerless spring of crystal purity, which the philosopher calls 
The Spring, is thickly shaded and sheltered, and is as cold as ice 
water at all stages of the summer. Another, higher up the hill, 
bubbles to view at a depth of twenty feet in a chasm of the earth. 
To this a ledge of twenty-nine steps leads. Pipes are laid from 
these springs to the neighbor's houses in the little village, and 
thence the whole hamlet obtains water free of water-tax, without 
money and without price. Nothing can illustrate Mr. G's abound- 
ing philanthrophy more than this. He is a whole Croton Board 
in himself, and furnishes })urer water at a cheaper rate and more 
inexhaustible supply to the little village of his friends than our 
elaborate commission, with all its accessories of Putnam county 
lakes and the great aqueduct seems able to do. 

THE philosopher's BEVERAGE. 

To the spring Mr. Greeley turns his steps eagerly the moment 
he leaves the cars on his return to the farm. There he takes his 
full draught of the sparkling liquid. His, favorite axe is brought 
to him by his foreman, Mr. Gordon, and, without more ado than 
the selection of a tree for demolition, he commences to cut at the 
root of the tree with a lusty swing equal to the intellectual vigor 
with which he cuts at the roots of things generally. 

THE SAGE AT THE AXE. 

He cuts right and left like broadsword combatants of the Bow- 
ery, and it is sometimes awkward to get too close to him. Since 
his nomination a number of friends have attended him during his 
short visits to Chappaqua, and in all instances he has invited them 
to try their skill in the chopping line. It is impossible to refuse. 

A TEST FOR WIRE PULLERS. 

Even the weakest muscled politician who ever wasted his phys- 
ical energies in the dark atmosphere of the court rooms thinks it 
possible to cut his way to the philosopher's regard by a dexterous 
handling of the axe. He thinks it is at least as easy as wire-pul- 
ling, until he tries it. When his tender hands are blistered, and 
his spinal cord is about breaking, and his arm at the shoulder feels 
like a coil of rope, and he sees the hero of the pen and the axe 
calmly swinging away right and left, one up, one down, with only 
one or two pearly drops of perspiration standing out upon his 
forehead, then he gives up that mode of "working his wires " and 
retires, usually leaving a promising hemlock gashed into hopeless 
ruin. Mr. Greeley wears all his visitors out at this pastime. Geo. 
Washington with his little hatchet lapses into imbecility beside 
him. He could never, in his palmiest days, have whacked big 
trees with the energy of the great Horace, nor given the " lie, you 
villain," with half his gusto. 



life of horace greeley. 55 

"take a drink." 

When his visitors are all worn out the great Horace ceases, and 
asks them blandly, "if it is'nt fine, healthy exercise?" and then 
he usually shows them his barns, his cows, his orchard, his gar- 
den, his evergreens, and ends up a tour of his farm by inviting all 
hands to take a drink at the peerless spring. 

THE villagers INTERESTED. 

Unfortunately for Chappaqua, the Sage spends very little of his 
time there. He usually goes out on Saturday morning and returns 
to town Saturday afternoon. It is very seldom now that hes])ends 
a night there at all. Both his houses are closed. His family is 
in Europe, and except the foreman and farm laborers, there is no 
one to look after his hermitage. All the villagers, however, keep 
an eye on it. If they see a stranger pulling at the crank which 
sounds the door bell of his roadside cottage they all volunteer to 
tell him that nobody lives there. 

" It's Mr. Greeley's place," they say, " but he's not at home, and 
the foreman's out in the woods." 

HONOR IN one's OV/N COUNTRY^ 

Chappaqua indeed seems to be proud of her distinction, as the 
residence of so great a man. The keeper of the Chappaqua 
House has been debating whether he ought not to swing out Mr 
Greeley's head for a sign, and a lager beer saloon, now in course 
of erection, is to be called the Greeley House. The bar-tenders 
even give a few five cent silver pieces in change, as a testimonial 
to Mr. Greeley's views on the specie payment cpiestion. Every 
voter in the village, except possibly three, are determined to vote 
for him. One old toper, a type of the traditional village toper, 
said " he had voted the straight Dimocratic ticket" (he was then 
taking his whisky straight) " for thirty years, but he'd vote for 
Mr. Greeley, and thought the Dimocratic Kimmittee was a dam 
fool to call another Kinvention, anyhow." 

" Do you think he 's any chance of election ?" 

"Chance.'' I should say so," responded the toper. " Why, all 
Chappaqua '11 vote for him !" 

To what extent the electoral votes of Chappaqua will influence 
the com*ing election had not heretofore disturbed the questioner's 
mind ; but this representative of the village evidently considered 
that the balance of power rested within its precincts. 

THE (IRUMBLING CHAPPAQUANS. 

The property holders of Chappaqua repine somewhat at Mr. 
Greeley's too frequent absence from his country home. They feel 
that it is within his power to greatly appreciate their property. 
His continued residence at the village would be better than a new 



56 LIFE OF HORACE GREELEY. 

railroad. Even as it is, property begins to look up. The tavern- 
keeper of Chappaqua has had a number of handsome offers to 
sell out, but is holding off for better prices. But things might be 
so much better if Mr. Greeley would stay at home that the people 
will grumble. The storekeeper complains mournfully that "a 
great many people 'd come here to see Mr. Greeley if he'd on'y 
stay here." 

The man who has wagons and horses to let says, " Many a 
people in the back country and toward the Hudson would be a 
driving in every day if Mr. Greeley was here more'n a few hours 
a week." 

A DISAPPOINTMENT. 

On Saturday night a party from Pleasantville, two miles below, 
came up with torches and brass bands to serenade the Sage, but 
found, after all their expense and trouble, that he had passed 
their village a few hours before on his return to the city. 

" There'd been a roaring time," says the bar-keeper of the 
village, " if he only stayed at home. With speechifying and music 
and torchlights and applejack drinking, old Chappaqua would 
have woke up, an' it'd put money in our pocket, too. 

GLORIOUS TIMES TO COME. 

" If we are to be in this 'ere campaign," adds another village 
type, *' we'd oughter make money. We'd oughter have delega- 
tions a-meeting here, and big meetings in Mr. Greeley's woods, 
and old-fashioned barbecues, and serenades and picnics" — and 
then, as his hopes were fanned by his imagination, he continued — 
"and we will have 'im yet. Mr. Greeley ain't a-going back on 
his old neighbors." 

PREPARATIONS. 

In consequence of the belief that these sanguine rustics enter- 
tain regarding the forthcoming treasures and excitements of the 
campaign, movements are in progress for the erection of a liberty 
pole, and the formation of Greeley Clubs, and the flaunting of 
Greeley banners, and the bright, rosy-cheeked damsels of Chap- 
paqua are already enjoying themselves in anticipation of fine 
times and heaps of city beaux all through the summer. 

A PASSING VIEW. 

As one instance of the interest now centering in Chappaqua, it 
is worthy of note that, when the trains stop, through-passengers 
step out on the platform and inquire which is Farmer Greeley's 
place ; and, on express trains (which pass Chappaqua at the 
rate of 25 miles an hour), anxious faces may be seen at the win- 
dows, eagerly searching among the various frame houses in the 
hamlet for that particular house on the road side of which they 
have all read — the homestead of Honest Horace. 




Hox. B. Gratz Brown. 



LIFE OF 



Soi). S. G^f kt^ ©f owi^, 



Liberal Republican Candidate for Vice-President. 



/^iT^ OVERNOR B. Gratz Brown, of Missouri, was the leader 
'^Irgvii) of the great Missouri campaign of 1870, which prepared 

\» r^m the way for the enunciation of a national policy. Though 
^ yet in the very prime of life, his public career has been a 
marvel of brilliant success, signaled throughout by a fearless con- 
temi)t of party trammels, and a bold and defiant leadership in the 
proclamation of advanced views. Governor Brown was born in 
Lexington, Kentucky, in 1824, graduated at Yale College, and 
moved to Missouri in 1850. He studied law and practiced with 
great success, but was elected to the Legislature in 1852, and re- 
mained there for a number of years, by successive re-elections. 
He entered public life as a Democrat and a follower of the great 
Benton, became idetified at once with the large German popula- 
tion of St. Louis, and during his whole career has been put for- 
Avard as their special representative among the public men of 
American birth. Though a Southerner by birth and extensive 
family associations, he proclaimed from the first his free-soil sym- 
pathies. To him belongs the rare distinction of making the first 
speech in behalf of Emancipation in a Southern Legislature. 
That speech, delivered at the peril of his life in the Missouri 
House of Representatives, and at the almost certain sacrifice of 
all hope of political preferment, was the rallying-cry of that Spar- 
tan band of Emancipationists who finally redeemed the State. 
The Germans, who had settled in large numbers in St. Louis, 
rallied to the support of Gratz Brown, and returned him to the 
Legislature, after a bitter contest. From this time on, his efforts 
were unceasing in the great cause of freedom. He founded the 
St, Louis Democrat as the organ of the Free-soilers, and as the 
fearless and brilliant editor of the only Anti-slavery journal in a 
slave State, soon won a national reputation. In all these efforts 
he faced the most bitter opposition. Both the great parties de- 
nounced and proscribed him. 



6o LIFE OP" B. GRATZ BROWN, 

This was just the occasion for his bold and defiant character. 
Opposition, threats, proscription, even peril of life, only intensified 
his devotion to the great principle of Human Freedom. Into the 
Kansas war he entered, with all the power and fire of his nature. 

His editorials in the Democrat, incisive and eloquent, startled 
the whole country. He early foresaw that the Kansas trouble 
would extend to a broader field, and, with his clear preception, 
warned the people of the magnitude of the coming struggle. In 
i860 he called the first Republican convention held in a slave 
State, and in conjunction with the veteran Muench and Emil 
Pretorius, the latter now associate editor with Carl Schurz in the 
Westliche Post, organized the Republican party of Missouri. At 
the outbreak of the war he at once raised a regiment, and with 
Blair and Lyon did efficient service in saving the State to the 
Xj Union. He took decided ground for immediate emancipation, 
and at once became the acknowledged leader of the advanced 
element of the Republican party, in opposition to the conservative 
element, and was put forward as their candidate for United States 
-^ Senator, The contest was bitter and protracted, but the Germans 
throughout the State rallied to the support of Brown, and after a 
struggle in the Legislature for several months, he was elected. 
His course in the Senate was in harmony with his previous career. 
He was one of the very first to recognize impartial suffrage as the 
necessary corollary to emancipation, and protested against any 
form of reconstruction which failed to recognize this principle. 
His health declining, and large private iaterests demanding his 
attention, he declined in 1866 a re-election ; and until 1870, though 
an interested observer, did not actively participate in any of the 
political movements. The Constitution of the State was intensely 
proscriptive, and, having opposed it in its inception, his views, 
whenever occasion called for their expression, were in opposition 
to a continuance of the policy which it legalized. The oppres- 
sions under it finally became unendurable, when the Liberals, 
under the lead of Brown and Schurz, with the same German ele- 
ment which had done such heroic service in the foundation of the 
Republican party, now demanded that the party recognize and 
declare the new order of things, and remove all political proscri])- 
tion from the law. The result is well known. Overpowered in a 
packed convention, the Liberals appealed to the people, with 
Gratz Brown as their standard-bearer. Never was a campaign 
entered upon under more unfavorable auspices. The whole power 
of the State and National Administrations was invoked to crush 
the Liberal movement. The course of the Democrats, who were 
in a hopeless minority, was for a long time undecided. But the 
Federal interference, only strengthened the cause, and Governor 
Brown was elected by the unprecedented majority of 42,000 ; re- 
ceiving the support of about one-half the Republicans of the State, 



LIFK OK II. CRATZ I'.ROWN. 6l 

including nearly all the Germans, and all of the old leaders in the 
cause of Freedom. 

His administration is a brilliant success. He has restored 
kindly feeling and harmony in a State much distracted by the 
passions of the war. Elected by the people, irrespective of party 
he has disregarded party trammels in the public station, and so, in 
the dispensation of his patronage, has inaugurated a genuine re- 
form of the civil service. His public messages bear striking evi- 
dence to the wonderful breadth and originality of his mind, and 
ranks him among the very first of American statesmen. His wise, 
temperate, judicious administration has completely buried the 
old partyisms in the State, and the Democrats and ex-Confeder- 
ates unite with his old Abolition friends in the enthusiastic in- 
dorsement of the model executive officer. The present position 
of Missouri is indeed a marvel. The first battle-ground of the 
struggle, the scene of its bitterest resentments, now presents to the 
country its own condition as the example of the only genuine re- 
construction. As Missouri Republicans were the first to proclaim 
war against the corruptions and despotism of the Administration, 
so Missouri Democrats were the first to proclaim the " passive 
policy " as the means to its overthrow. 

The position of Missouri to-day is the unanswerable argument 
of the Missouri policy. 

Such is a brief sketch of the remarkable career of Gratz Brown. 
In bold and successful leadership, in battling for great principles, 
his record is one of which no other American statesman can boast. 
His public life has been a warfare, first against slavery, and now 
against proscription and centralization ; first contending for indi- 
vidual, and now for local freedom. Always a leader, always con- 
sistent with himself, and always successful — one of the foremost 
leaders in the new revolution, and by many thoughtful observers 
regarded as the leading statesman of the Mississippi valley. 

PROCEEDINGS OF THE LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION HELD 
AT CINCINNATI, MAY I, 2 AND 3. 

The convention building is known as Exposition Hall, located 
on the corner of Elm and Fourteenth streets. Excellent prepar- 
ations had been made by the local committee to preserve order 
and furnish accommodations. Besides, the great hall had been 
tastefully ornamented. A line of flags overhung the galleries on 
both sides of the hall. Beneath these a continuous line of looped 
evergreens fell from every white column, so as to expose above 
the row of painted shields of the different States, each shield bear- 
ing the name of the State in black letters on a white bar dexter. 
The pillars supporting the galleries were also wrapped with ever- 
greens as far up as the gallery, and a circle was left in a large mass 
of evergreens for a small shield. I'he stage was very beautifully 



62 LIFE OF B. GRATZ BROWN. 

treated with long skeins of evergreens, covering nearly over the 
president's head, and at the point of convergence a great bulbous 
mass of ivy creeper and laurel, fresh and sparkling, dropped down 
and swung in the clear upper light. Over this a huge wreath of 
evergreen was suspended from the gas fixtures. The gas standards 
on each side of the president's stand were wrapped-with silk flags, 
wound round with evergreens. The rear of the stage was cov- 
ered by a screen of silken flags, with a sheaf of standards and 
eagles, surmounted first with the effigy of a large spread-eagle, and 
above with the coat-of-arms of Cincinnati, beautifully draped. A 
small thicket of tropical and temperate blooms was distributed in 
front of and on the plank of this screen. Up in the high gable 
of the hall was a large painting of the Muse of History reading 
from a volume. 

When the spacious hall was filled, it presented a magnificent 
aspect. The fine, intelligent faces of the delegates, the gayly- 
dressed ladies, and the immense audience, made a scene never to 
be forgotten by the fortunate spectator. It was understood that the 

OPENING OF THE CONVENTION 

would take place promjjtly at noon, on Wednesday. Long before 
this hour, however, the hall was crowded with delegates and spec- 
tators, to its utmost capacity. The platform, and even the bal- 
cony for the musicians, were turned over to delegates. The stage, 
which was arranged for the seating of three or four hundred people, 
was packed, and the spaces allotted to the press with outsiders. 
The delegations filed in without confusion. The ladies' gallery 
had been, through some error, kept closed, and remained for a 
time empty, but before the proceedings began a great rush set in 
thither, and in a few minutes all the available space was seized. 
The floor of the building was perfectly level, and a wide sea of 
faces covered the immense surface from wall to wall ; the galler- 
ies, arranged sloping, presented the same aspect, and from the 
stage the scene was a magnificent one; face to face, there could 
be no mistaking the material of this impressive assembly. 

Colonel William M. Grosvenor, of Missouri, called the conven- 
tion to order at a quarter past twelve, and after stating, in a few 
words, the object of the gathering, nominated Judge Stanley Mat- 
thews, of Ohio, for temporary chairman. His Honor's remarks on 
accepting were felicitous and striking, eliciting ^burst after burst 
of applause. 

Senator Carl Schurz appearing in the hall shortly after, was 
hailed with deafening cheers, which subsided only when he a 
made a brief return of the compliment. In order to perfect State 
delegations, an adjournment was announced until the following 
morning, and the meeting broke up. 

On Thursday the convention re-assembled. As agreed on, each 
State and Territory was represented by delegates double the num- 



LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 6;^ 

ber of its congressional districts, and four delegates at large. The 
delegations, respectively headed by their chairman, duly marched 
into the hall and took the seats which were now regularly assigned 
them inside the barrier. The names of the States appeared on 
conspicuous sign-boards above the heads of the several delega- 
tions. Beyond the barrier, on the floor and in the galleries over 
head, an audience even larger than that of yesterday crammed 
every square foot of space, and men swarmed like bees among the 
beams and braces that supported the ceiling. The stage, too, 
was overcrowded, and during the sessions it was difticult to move 
about among the vast, closely-packed multitude. 

THE SECOND DAv's PROCEEDINGS. 

Judge Matthews called the assemblage to order, but an incident 
occurred that, for a time, interrupted the meeting. Theodore 
Tilton appeared, elbowing his way down the central aisle, and in 
his train were Miss Susan B. Anthony, and Miss Laura DeForce 
Gordon, of California. As they passed up the steps on to the 
platform, the audience rose and gave them a good-humored cheer. 
The band played " Come to the Gipsy Camp," and for a fiiw mo- 
ments there was general hilarity. 

The first business of note was the selection of Carl Schurz for 
permanent president, whose acceptance was the signal for another 
ovation to the popular German Senator. As he appeared to re- 
spond to the honor, the band played " Hail to the Chief." Mr. 
Schurz delivered a most trenchant speech, which enlisted the earn- 
est attention of his vast audience. Much time was consumed in 
the consideration of the report of the committee on credentials, 
and the subject of the teriff question. Three sessions were held 
on Thursday, each being well attended and followed by outside 
caucuses. 

BALLOTING FOR CANDIDATES. 

On Friday, the third and last day, the greatest excitement was 
manifested. Mr. Horace White, chairman of the committee on 
the platform, presented an address and series of resolutions as a 
sober expression of the duties of the hour and the honest demands 
of the people. The report Avas received with unanimous favor 
as the official platform of the convention. 

The next order of business was stated by the chair to be the 
nomination of candidates for the presidency, without the formal 
presentation of candidates. The roll of States was then called. 

Before the vote was announced, Hon. Gratz Brown ascended 
the rostrum, and was received with loud cheers. He spoke as 
follows : 

Jfr. President and Gentlemen of the Convention : Although a 
delegate to this convention, it has not been possible for me to meet 
with you until to-day, as I have been detained at home by official 



64 LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 

business; and now when I come in for the first time, I find myself 
in an embarrassing condition. Some of my good friends from my 
own State, and many from other States, have done me the honor 
to cast their votes for me for the highest office in the gift of this 
nation. Now I do not disguise from myself that this is worthy 
the pride and ambition of any man on the broad face of the globe, 
but also recognize the fact that it requires ability, culture, expe- 
rience, age, and many qualities which my modesty forbids me to 
believe, and which my judgment convinces me I do not possess. 
I therefore, after tendering to you, gentlemen, my thanks for the 
compliment which you have given me, desire to say in brief that 
I came to this convention with no personal end ; that I am ani- 
mated sincerely and solely by the desire of victory in this great 
contest [cheers], and that I want the man nominated \rho will re- 
ceive the largest republican vote in the nation, in opposition to 
the regular Grant organization, and that in my judgment that man 
is Horace Greeley. 

This concluding declaration was scarcely ended before numer- 
ous delegates broke forth into uproarious plaudits, but as these 
dwindled toward silence a well-defined, concerted hiss crept 
through the building. As it began to make itself heard and felt, 
the applause again took up its role, and drowned out the opposing 
utterance. This cadence dropping in force and loudness, the 
hisses which had not ceased, notwithstanding the tumult, again 
struck on the ears, and gave a' new impulse to the noisy demon- 
strative favoritism. The struggle continued for a space of nearly 
two minutes, when some delegate called for three cheers for 
Greeley, which were given with open-mouthed vehemence, and 
brought the contest of approbation and disapprobation to a close. 
The effect of the speech was immediately seen in the following 
changes: The delegate from Missouri desired to change the vote 
of his State, thirty solid votes for Brown, to be given to Greeley. 
Many changes were made in the votes, and on the first ballot 
there was no choice. The enthusiasm increased momentarily. 
The second ballot was as follows : 

Greeley 239 

Adams 243 

Trumbull --14S 

Davis - 81 

Brown 2 

Chase i 

Other changes were made by States. 

At the end of the tliird call the vote footed up as follows : 

Greeley — 258 

Trumbull - 156 

Adams 264 

Davis - 44 

Brown 2 



LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 65 

Brief consultations ensued. Heads nodded, eyes winked, hands 
beat all manner of time. 

The roll was called for the fourth time, resulting as follows : 

Adams 279 

Greeley 251 

Trumbull -141 

Davis 51 

Brown 2 

Every vote gained for Adams and Greeley was received with 
cheers. 

The poll stood as follows at the close of the fifth ballot : 

Adams 309 

Greeley 258 

Trumbull 91 

Davis 30 

Brown 2 

Chase 24 

The excitement now became delirious. Leaders of delegations 
endeavored to gain the fullest information from their associates 
for the next struggle. 

The chair declared the following the result of the poll at the 
close of the sixth ballot : 

Adams 324 

Greeley 332 

Trumbull 19 

Davis 6 

Chase 32 

Palmer i 

Before the vote was formally announced, Minnesota changed 
nine from Trumbull to Greeley. Various States changed their 
votes. A scene of great confusion and noise followed. Mr. Mc- 
Clure changed Pennsylvania to fifty for Greeley and six for Davis. 
(Great cheers). Indiana changed to twenty-seven for Greeley. 
A stampede of changes to Greeley here occurred, and the noise 
and confusion that followed were very great. 

Illinois changed solid to Greeley, except one delegate, who in- 
sisted that his vote should stand for Trumbull. The chair finally 
announced the result as follows : 

Whole vote 714 

Necessary to a choice 358 

Adams 187 

Greeley -48^ 



66 - LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 

The second and last ballot for candidate foi- Vice-President 
resulted as follows : 

Whole number of votes . 696 

Necessary to a choice -349 

Brown 435 

Julian 175 

Walker 75 

Tipton 3 

Palmer 8 

The great business being concluded, a resolution of thanks to 
Cincinnati, for her hospitality, and to the officers of the conven- 
tion, were adopted, and President Schurz declared the Liberal 
Republican Convention adjourned st'/ie die. 



(ADDRESS AND RESOLUTIONS 

OF THE LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION, HELD AT CINCINNATI, 
MAY I, 2, AND 3, 1 87 2. 

[Official Cfl/>J.] 



Address I0 the People of the United States : 

The Administration now in power has rendered itself guilty of 
wanton disregard of the laws of the land, and of usurping powers 
not granted by the Constitution ; it has acted as if the laws had 
binding force only for those who are governed, and not for those 
who govern. It has thus struck a blow at the fundamental prin- 
ciples of Constitutional government and the liberties of the 
citizens. 

The President of the United States has openly used the powers 
and opportunities of his high office for the promotion of personal 
ends. 

He has kept notoriously corrupt and unworthy men in places 
of power and responsibility, to the detriment of the public in- 
terest. 

He has used the public service of the government as a machin- 
ery of corruption and personal influence, and has interfered, with 
tyrannical arrogance, in the political affairs of States and muni- 
cipalities. 



Lir.KUAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 67 

He has rewarded with influential and lucrative offices men 
who had acquired his favor by valuable presents, thus stimulating 
the demoralization of our political life by his conspicuous example. 

He has shown himself deplorably unequal to the task imposed 
upon him by the necessities of the country, and culpably careless 
of the responsibilities of his high office. 

The partisans of the administration, assuming to be the re- 
publican party, and controlling its organization, have attempted 
to justify such wrongs, and palliate such abuses, to the end of 
maintaining partisan ascendancy. 

They have stood in the way of necessary investigations and in- 
dispensable reforms, pretending that no serious fault could be 
found with the present administration of public affairs, thus seek- 
ing to blind the eyes of the people. 

They have kept alive the passions and resentments of the late 
civil war, to use them for their own advantage; they have resorted 
to arbitrary measures in direct conflict with the organic law, in- 
stead of appealing to the better instincts and latent patriotism of 
the southern people by restoring to them these rights, the enjoy- 
ment of which is indispensable to a successful administration of 
their local affairs, and would tend to revive a patriotic and hope- 
ful national feeling. 

They have degraded themselves and the name of their party, 
once justly entitled to the confidence of the nation, by a base syc- 
ophancy to the dispenser of executive power and patronage 
unworthy of republican freemen ; they have sought to silence the 
voice of just criticism, and stifle the moral sense of the people, 
and to subjugate public opinion by tyrannical party discipline. 

They are striving to maintain themselves in authority for selfish 
ends by an unscrupulous use of the power which rightfully 
belongs to the people, and should be employed only in the service 
of the country. 

Believing that an organization thus led and controlled can no 
longer be of service to the best interests of the Republic, we have 
resolved to make an independent appeal to the sober judgment, 
conscience, and patriotism of the American people?^ 

RESOLUTIONS. 

"We, the Liberal Republicans of the United States in National 
Convention Assembled at Cincinnati, proclaim the following prin- 
ciples as essential to just government : 

1. We recognize the equality of all men before the law, and 
hold that it is the duty of government, in its dealings with the 
people, to mete out equal and exact justice to all, of whatever 
nativity, race, color or persuasion, religious or political. 

2. We pledge ourselves to maintain the Union of the States, 
emancipation and enfranchisement, and oppose any re-opening of 



6S LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 

the questions settled by the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth 
Amendments of the Constitution. 

3. We demand the immediate and absolute removal of all dis- 
abilities imposed on account of the rebellion which was finally 
subdued seven years ago, believing that universal amnesty will 
result in complete pacification in all sections of the country. 

4. Local self-government, with impartial suffrage, will guard 
the rights of all citizens more securely than any centralized power. 
The public welfare requires the supremacy of the civil over the 
military authority, and the freedom of person under the protec- 
tion of the habeas corpus. We demand for the individual the 
largest liberty consistent with public order, for the State self- 
government, and for the Nation a return to the methods of peace 
and the Constitutional limitations of power. 

5. The Civil Service of the government has become a mere 
instrument of partisan tyranny and personal ambition, and an 
object of selfish greed. It is a scandal and reproach upon free 
institutions, and breeds a demoralization dangerous to the j)er- 
petuity of Republican government. 

6. We, therefore, regard a thorough reform of the Civil Ser- 
vice as one of the most i)ressing necessities of the hour ; that 
honesty, capacity and fidelity constitute the only valid claims to 
public employment ; that the offices of the government cease to 
be a matter of arbitrary favoritism and patronage, and that public 
station shall become again a place of honor. To this end it is 
imperatively required that no President shall be a candidate for 
re-election. 

7. We demand a system of federal taxation which shall not 
unnecessarily interfere with the industry of the people, and which 
shall provide the means necessary to pay the expenses of the 
government, economically administered, the pensions, the interest 
on the public debt, and a moderate annual reduction of the prin- 
cipal thereof; and recognizing that there are, in our midst, honest 
but irreconcilable differences of opinion with regard to the 
respective systems of Protection and Free Trade, we remit the 
discussion of the subject to the people in their Congressional 
Districts, and the decision of Congress thereon, wholly free from 
Executive interference or dictation. 

8. The public credit must be sacredly maintained, and we 
denounce repudiation in every form and guise. 

9. A speedy return to specie payments is demanded alike by 
the highest considerations of commercial morality and honest 
government. 

ID. We remember with gratitude the heroism and sacrifices of 
the soldiers and sailors of the Republic, and no act of ours shall 
ever detract from their justly earned fame or the full rewards of 
their patriotism. 



LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 69 

11. We are opposed to all further grants of land to railroads or 
other corporations. The public domain should be held sacred to 
actual settlers. 

12. We hold that it is the duty of the government in its inter- 
course with foreign nations to cultivate the friendships of peace, 
by treating with all on fair and equal terms, regarding it alike 
dishonorable either to demand what is not right or submit to what 
is wrong. 

13. For the promotion and success of these vital principles, and 
the support of the candidates nominated by this Convention, we 
invite and cordially welcome the co-operation of all patriotic 
citizens, without regard to previous political affiliations. 

MR. Greeley's letter of acceptance on being notified of 
HIS nomination. 

New York, May 3, 1S72. 
To Whitelaw Rcid : 

Please tender my grateful acknowledgments to the members of 
the convention for the generous confidence they have shown me, 
and assure them I shall endeavor to deserve it. 

Horace Greeley. 



Cincinnati, May 3, 1872. 
Dear Sir : The National Convention of Liberal Republicans 
of the United States have instructed the undersigned, president, 
vice-president and secretaries of the convention, to inform you 
that you have been nominated as the candidate of the Liberal 
Republicans for the Presidency of the United States. We also 
submit to you the address and resolutions unanimously adopted 
by the convention. Be pleased to signify to us your acceptance 
of the platform and nomination, and believe us very truly yours, 

C. Schurz, P 7- e si dent. 
George W. Julian, Vice-President. 
William E. McLane, John X. Davidson, J. H. Rhodes, Sec- 
retaries. 

To Hon. Horace Greeley, New York City. 



MR. GREELEY S REPLY, 



New York, 20th May, 1872. 
Gentlemen : I have chosen not to acknowledge your letter of 
the 3d instant, until I could learn how the work of your conven- 
tion was received in all parts of our great country, and judge whether 
that work was approved and ratified by the masses of our fellow- 



•JO LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 

citizens. Their response has from day to day reached me through 
telegrams, letters and comments of journalists independent of 
official patronage and indifferent to the smiles or frowns of power. 
The number and character of these unconstrained, unpurchased, 
unsolicited utterances, satisfy me that the movement which found 
expression at Cincinnati has received the stamp of public approval, 
and been hailed by a majority of our countrymen as the harbin- 
ger of a better day for the republic. I do not ministerpret this 
approval as especially complimentary to myself, nor even to the 
chivalrous and justly esteemed gentleman with whose name I thank 
your convention for associating mine. I receive and welcome it 
as a spontaneous and deserved tribute to that admirable platform 
of principles, wherein your convention so tersely so lucidly, so 
forcibly set forth the convictions which impelled and the purposes 
which guided its course — a platform which, casting behind it the 
wreck and rubbish of worn-out contentions and bygone feuds, em- 
bodies in fit and few words, the needs and aspirations of to-day. 
Though thousands stand ready to condemn your every act, hardly 
a syllable of criticism or cavil has been aimed at your platform, 
of which the substance may be fairly epitomized as follows : 

1. All political rights and franchises, which have been acquired 
through our late bloody convulsion, must and shall be guaranteed, 
maintained, enjoyed and respected evermore. 

2. All political rights and franchises which have been lost 
through that convulsion should, and must, be promptly restored 
and re-established, so that there shall be henceforth no jiroscribed 
class and no disfranchised caste within the limits of our Union, 
whose long estranged people shall reunite and fraternize upon the 
broad basis of universal amnesty and impartial suffrage. 

3. That, subject to our solemn constitutional obligation to 
maintain the equal rights of all citizens, our policy should aim at 
local self-government and not centralization; that the civil author- 
ity should be supreme over the military ; that the writ of Jiaheas 
corpus should be zealously upheld as the safeguard of personal 
freedom ; that the individual citizen should enjoy the largest lib- 
erty consistent wath public order, and that there shall be no federal 
subversion of internal polity of the several States and municipali- 
ties, but that each shall be left free to enforce rights, and promote 
the well-being of its inhabitants by such means as the judgment 
of its own people shall prescribe. 

4. There shall be a real, and not merely a simulated reform, 
in the Civil Service of the republic, to which end it is indis])ens- 
able that the chief dispenser of its vast official patronage shall be 
shielded from main temptation to use his power selfishly, by a rule 
inexorably forbidding and precluding his re-election. 

5. That the raising of revenue, whether by tariff or otherwise, 
shall be recognized and treated as the people's immediate busi- 
ness, to be shaped and directed by them through their represent- 



LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION. 7 1 

atives in Congress, whose action thereon the President must 
neither over-rule by his veto, attempt to dictate, nor presume to 
punish by bestowing office only on those who agree with him, or 
withdrawing it from those who do not. 

6. That the public lands must be sacredly reserved for occu- 
pation and acquisition by cultivators, and not recklessly squan- 
dered on i)rojects of railroads for which our people have no 
present need, and the premature construction of which is annually 
plunging us into deeper and deeper abysses of foreign indebt- 
edness. 

7. That the achievement of these grand purposes of universal 
beneficence, is expected and sought at the hands of all who ap- 
prove them, irrespective of past affiliations. 

8. That the public faith must be maintained and the national 
credit preserved. 

9. That the patriotic devotedness and inestimable services of 
our fellow-citizens, who as soldiers or sailors, upheld the flag and 
maintained the unity of the republic, shall ever be gratefully 
remembered and honorably requited. 

These propositions, so ably and forcibly presented in the plat- 
form of your convention, have already fixed the attention and 
commanded the assent of a large majority of our countrymen, 
who joyfully adopt them, as I do, as the basis of a true, beneficent 
national reconstruction ; of a new departure from jealousies, 
strifes, and hates, which have no longer adequate motive, or even 
plausible pretext, into an atmosphere of peace, fraternity, and 
mutual good will. In vain do the drill-sergeants of decaying 
organizations flourish menacingly their truncheons, and angrily 
insist that the files shall be closed and straightened. In vain do 
the whippers-in of parties, once vital, because rooted in the vital 
needs of the hour, protest against straying and bolting, denounce 
men nowise their inferiors, as traitors and renegades, and threaten 
them with infamy and ruin. I am confident that the American 
people have already made your cause their own, fully resolved 
that their brave hearts and strong arms shall bear it on to triumph. 
In this faith, and with the distinct understanding that if elected 
I shall be the President, not of a party, but of the whole people, I 
accept your nomination, in the confident trust that the masses of 
our countrymen, north and south, are eager to clasp hands across 
the bloody chasm that has too long divided them, forgetting that 
they have been enemies in the joyful consciousness that they are, 
and must henceforth remain, brethren. Yours, gratefully, 

Horace Greeley. 

To Hon. Carl Schurz, President; Hon. George W. Julian, Vice 
President; and Messrs. William E. McLane, John X. Davidson, 
T. H. Rhodes, Secretaries of the National Convention of Liberal 
Republicans of the United States. 



72 GREELEY AND BROWN. 

, WE'RE ALL FOR HORACE. 



BY GEORGE ALFRED TOWNSEND. 

'Tis honest Horace Greeley, 

With his old white coat and staff! 
The politicians laugh in fear, 

In joy the people laugh ; 
A laugh comes o'er the Paddy's face, 

And o'er the Negro's mouth, 
And first, since all these bloody years. 

Laughs, too, the wounded South ! 

With laughter like the summer, 

" Let us have peace," indeed, 
And not the frosty soldier piece 

Whose word's a broken reed ; 
But with this grand old neighbor's rule. 

And times of golden law. 
Old hatreds shall be turned to loves 

And laughter to huzza. 

The camp fires burn for Greeley, 

But not on fields of arms ; 
They burn by thinking cotters' hearths. 

And wink from prairie farms, 
Where good old couples rub their palms. 

And say : " Praise God, 'tis so ! 
Since ruled so long by men who kill. 

To vote for one we know." 

Put by the lamp, friend Horace ! 

Thy kindly, busy quill. 
When we have made thee President, 

Then shalt thou have thy will. 
For thirty years of earnest work 

Deserve a ruler's wish, 
That " when he sees the country safe 

He'd like to go and fish." 

Ah ! better had these Captains, 

Who laugh to their dismay, 
Said half the wise things in their reign 

Thou sayest every day ! 
And better had they fished like thee. 

Or farmed as bad, dear sage, 
Then fished for rich men's company^ 

And farmed out patronage I 



BROWN AND GREELEY. 73 

Some wise men fear thy kindness, 

Thy crotchets some distress, 
Some fear thy sturdy temperance, 

And some thy simple dress, 
These only feel their private wish, 

When they good Greeley scan, 
But all the mighty people feel 

An earnest fellow man ! 

Stand up and shout, ye laughers ! 

The laughing sun comes out ; 
Together let the Northern Yank 

And Southern Johnny shout; 
For Brown and Greeley break the night, 

And lead the era in ; 
They'll teach us how to laugh and farm, — 

We'll teach them how to win ! 



THE CHEERING NEWS. 



Say, have you heard the cheering news .'* 
Grant and Morton have got the blues ; 
The people know what they're about — 
They're going to turn all barnacles out. 
Hurrah ! Hurrah ! 

All classes know our cause is true ; 
We will vote for Brown, and Greeley too 
For him who leads the Workingman, 
And Old Kentucky's gifted son. 

Hurrah ! Hurrah ! 

From every State we hear the cry ; 
The rallying shout is rising high ; 
And Horace G., they'll find, will be 
As popular as Old Hickory. 

Hurrah ! Hurrah ! 

The North and South, the East and West 
Will all join hands to do the best; 
And Freemen's votes, cast at the polls, 
Will drive the shoddies in their holes. 
Hurrah ! Hurrah ! 



74 DROWN AND GREELEY. 

THE LAST LAY OF USELESS BEFORE HE WAS LAID 
OUT BY H. G. AND THE PEOPLE. 



Am— '' Pitt Me in My Little Bedy 

O, Forney, I am tired now 

I do not care to hear you sing ; 
You've sung your ancient songs all day, 
So put your head beneath your wing, 
You soon will go for Greeley too, 

Because you love the winning side; 
What then shall I, poor Useless do 
Whom all men hate, or else deride ? 
Chorus — Come, Forney, come, 
Kiss me good night, 
In grief I hang my low-browed head ; 

My friends have left for Chappaqua ; 
Put Grantv in his leetle bed ! 



The Sitn^ that shines for all true men, 

Has no mild beams to shed on me ; 
It scorns my stud and bull-pups ten. 

And scolds me 'cause I love a spree. 
I wish I now was at Long Branch, 

In Murphy's cottage by the sea, 
I must vamose the White House ranch, 

Unless I head off Horace G. ^ 

Come, Forney, come, ' 

Kiss me good night, &c. 



Oh ! joy — a happy thought for once 

Soothes this dull head and bosom sore. 
Send for Dan VoorJices ! — what a dunce, 

I did not think of him before. 
I want some Democratic tools 

To clamor for a ticket straight, 
To make their party blasted fools. 
And help me run my Coach of State. 
Come, Forney, come, 
Kiss me good night. 
Then go and leave me with the dead, 

My friends are bound for Chappaqua, 
So put me in my little bed. 



GRANT S FAMILY RIXG. 



GRANT'S FAMILY RING. 



Forty-one of 'em 

(Keep the run of 'em), 
Suckers all — the State needs none of 'em — 

Avoirdupois, there's more than three ton of 'em — 
Humbugs, every suu of a gun of 'em. 

Old Daddy Grant, 

The Boss Cormorant, 
Feathers his nest in the Covington Post Office, 

Orville L. G. 

(Hunky -boy on a spree) 
Draws on his jjal in an Illinois coast office — 
Half the connections of 'Lysses can boast office — 

Corbins and Dents, 

Cramers and Bents, 
Sharpes, and Boots, and Caseys, and Pattons ; 

But the Dents take the lead 

Of the whole blessed breed. 
For when the places were going they went in I'or the fat 'uns. 

Brothers-in-law, nephews and cousins. 

Groups of 'em, troops of 'em — several dozens — 
Billeted all on a tax-ground community. 
Plundering, whenever they find opportunity, 
Mocking the people with perfect impunity ! 

O what a set ! 

Lucifer's net, 
In a hundred prime casts, such a haul couldn't get. 
Ministers, Judges, Ajipraisers, Collectors, 
Marshals, Assessors, Surveyors, Inspectors, 
Postmasters, Mail Agents, uninformed Hectors, 

Gods what a corps of 'em ! 

Wait — there'll be more of 'em ; 
Forty-and-one — there will soon be three-score of 'em ; 
Outside are hungry ones — list to the roar of 'em ! 

Chief and head man, 

U. S. G. leads the van. 
Rob-Roying the ])ublic to fatten his clan. 

If you're Rob-Roy's relation. 

Walk up, take your ration ; 
If not, and you sign for a government station. 
Put your hand in your pocket and try a donation. 
Motives in these days are not to be sifted 
When knaves to office are suddenly lifted. 

We say, when we hear 

Of the act, it is clear 
Grant, though not great, is unconunonly gifted. 



B. GRATZ brown's LETTER OF ACCEPTANCE. 



HON. B. GRATZ BROWN'S LETTER OF 
ACCEPTANCE. 



In reply to the notification of his nomination as Vice-Presi- 
dent, by the Cincinnati Convention, Governor Brown makes the 
following response : 

Executive Office, / 

Jefferson City, May 31, 1872. j 

Gentlemen : Your letter advising me of the action of the Lib- 
eral Republican Convention at Cincinnati has been received, and 
I return through you my acknowledgment of the honor which has 
been conferred on me. I accept the nomination as candidate for 
Vice-President, and indorse, most cordially, the resolutions setting 
forth the principles on which this appeal is made to the whole 
people of the United States. A century is closing upon our expe- 
rience of republican government, and while that lapse of time has 
witnessed great expansion of our free institutions, yet it has not 
been without illustrations also of grave dangers to the stability of 
such system. Those successfully encountered, it is needless to 
speak of. Those which remain to menace us most threateningly, 
are provided against, as I firmly believe, in the wise and pacific 
measures proposed by your platform. It has come to be the prac- 
tice of those elevated to positions of national authority to regard 
the public service, not as a public trust, but only as a means to 
retain power. This results in substituting party organization for 
the government itself; constitutes a control amenable to no laws 
or moralities ; impairs all independent thought ; enables the few 
to rule the many ; and makes personal allegiance the road to favor. 
It requires little forecast to perceive that this will wreck our lib- 
erties, unless there be interposed a timely reform of the adminis- 
tration, from its highest to its lowest station, which shall not only 
forbid abuses, but likewise take away the incentive to this prac- 
tice. Wearied with the contentions that are carried on in avarice 
of spoils, the country resents the efforts of officials to dragoon it 
again into partisan hostilities, and will zealously sustain any move- 
ment promising a sure deliverance. 

Of the perils which have been connected with the war, it is safe 
to say that only those are now to be feared which come of an 
abuse of victory into permanent estrangement. The Union is 
fortified by more power than ever before, and it remains as an im- 



B. GRATZ DROWN S LETTER OF ACCEPTANCE. 

perative duty to cement our Nationality by a perfect reconcilia- 
tion. At the North a wide-spread sympathy is aroused in behalf 
of those States of the South which, long after the termination of 
resistance to rightful federal authority, are still plundered under 
the guise of loyalty, and tyrannized over in the name of freedom. 
Along with this feeling is present, too, the recognition that in 
comi)lete amnesty alone can be found hope of any return to con- 
stitutional government as of old, or any development of a more 
enduring unity and broader national life in the future. Amnesty, 
however, to be efficacious, must be real, not nominal ; genuine, not 
evasive. It must carry along with it equal rights, as well as equal 
protection to all ; for the removal of disabilities as to some, with 
enforcement as to others, leaves room for suspicion that pardon 
is measured by political gain. Especially will such proffered 
clemency be futile in the presence of renewed attempts at pro- 
longing a suspension of the habeas corpus^ in a persistent resort tO' 
marshal rather than civil law, in upholding those agencies used tO' 
alienate races whose concord is most essential, and in preparing 
another elaborate campaign on a basis of dead issues and arbi- 
trary interventions. AH will rightly credit such conduct as but a 
mockery of amnesty, and demand an administration which can 
give better warrant of honesty in the great work of reconstruction 
and reform. 

In the array of sectional interests a republic so wide-spread as 
ours is never entirely safe from serious conflicts. These become 
still more dangerous when complicated with questions of taxation, 
where unequal burdens are believed to be imposed on one part at 
the expense of another part. It was a bold, as well as admirable 
policy, in the interest of present^ as well as future tranquility, to 
withdraw the decision of industrial and revenue matters from the 
virtual arbitration of an Electoral College, chosen with a single 
animating purpose of party ascendancy, and refer them for a more 
direct popular expression to each congressional district, and instead 
of being muzzled by some evasive declaration, the country is 
thereby invited to its frankest utterance, and sections which would 
revolt at being denied a voice, out of deference to other sections, 
would be content to acquiesce in a general judgment honestly 
elicited. If local government be, as it undoubtedly is, the most 
vital principle of our institutions, much advance will be made 
toward re-establishing it by enabling the people to pass upon ques- 
tions so nearly affecting their well-being dispassionately through 
their local representation. The precipitancy which would force 
a controlling declaration on the tax or tariff through the presi- 
dential candidacy is only a disguised form of centralization, involv- 
ing hazardous breaches of executive influence. The conclusion 
will be much more impartially determined, and with less disturb- 
ance to trade and finances, by appealing to the most truthful and 
diversified local expression. Industrial issues can be thus likewise 



B. GRATZ BROWN S LETTER OF ACCEPTANCE. 

emancipated from the favor of great monopolies, each canvass 
made to determine its own specific instruction, and each represen- 
tative held to fidelity towards his immediate constituents. These 
are the most prominent features of the general concert of action 
which proposes to replace the present administration by one more 
in sympathy with the aspirations of the masses of our countrymen. 
Of course, such concert cannot be attained by thrusting every 
minor or past difference into the foreground, and it will be for the 
people, therefore, to determine whether these objects are of such 
magnitude and present urgency as to justify them in deferring 
other adjustments until the country shall be first restored to a free 
suffrage, uninfluenced by official dictation, and ours become, in 
fact, a free republic, released from apprehension of a central dom- 
ination. 

Without referring in detail to various other propositions em- 
braced in the resolutions of the convention, but seeing how all 
contemplate restoration of power to the people, peace to the 
nation, and purity to the government; that they condemn the 
attempt to establish an ascendancy of military over civil rule, and 
affirm with explicitness the maintenance of equal freedom to all 
citizens, irrespective of race, previous condition, or pending disa- 
bilities, I have only to again pledge myself and my sincere co-ope- 
ration. 

I have the honor to remain, very respectfully, yours, 

(Signed) B. Gratz Brown.. 








MR. GKEELEY ON HIS FARM. 



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LIFE AM) IHBLIC Hl^RVlCKS 



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LIBERAL REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE 



I'OR I'RKSIIUON r (JF IHi: I'M I Kl) SIAIT.S, 



HON.B. GRATZ BROWN, 

c:a.\1)IDATE for vice fresh )Kxr; 

Wrril A RECORD OF 

ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE, PLATFORM oF THE I'ARTV. 
£'/C., E/\\ 



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